eateggs

Indian money makes me happy. Or, rather– lest you think I’ve sunk to the depths of materialism– I should say that Indian currency makes me happy. It’s not I’m happy to have the money, but rather that I’m happy to be carrying a wallet full of a rainbow of colorful, smiling Gandhis (that’s the plural form of Gandhi, mind you!). I mean, c’mon: if this was in your wallet, you’d be smiling, too.

It’s not that particularly like the rupee as a currency— in fact, in terms using it to pay for things, it borders on being rather annoying, but, well, there’s a certain fun to it just the same. It’s fun because, well, you never know what you’ve got, or what you’re going to get. The bills, which come in smiling-Gandhi denominations of 5, 10, 20, 50, 100, 500 and 1,000 rupees are color coded, and in increasing sized. Or, mostly– except for that one 500 rupee bill that I got from the ATM that was the 100 rupee color, not the 500 rupee color. And, no, it’s not a fluke, either.

But the coins are where it really gets fun. Sagar admits disappointment at discovering that rupees weren’t, in fact, shiny gems, gained by fighting monsters and killing chickens, as in Zelda, but rather dull silver colored coins, although the procedure for getting rupees is much the same (pressing the right series of buttons), but at an ATM, rather than on a Nintendo… Although not little, shiny gems, the rupee coins (which come in 1, 2, and 5 rupee denominations) are rather fun– not only because they’re relatively large, and make a satisfying “clink” sound in an empty pocket, but also because they’re pretty random. The new 1 rupee coins are actually marginally smaller than the 1 rupee coins, but since there’s about 6 different 1 and 2 rupee coins floating around, well… the only way to tell which is which is to flip it to the side with the numeral and take a look– size is of no help. But that just adds to the fun of it. =)

Of the currencies I’ve encountered, the Thai baht is far and away my favorite. It’s amazingly simple– three coins, four bills– and amazingly sensible. The both coins and bills increase in size increase according to value. Thus, a 10 baht coin is larger than a 5 baht coin. Imagine that. And not only do the bills get larger as their denominations increase, but they’re sensibly color-coded. Every 500 baht bill is the same color. Red. And it’s the only bill that’s red. Imagine that. The 20 baht bill is green. The 100, blue. The 1000, white. It’s almost as though someone thought about the currency system, before the mints went into operation.

And then there’s the fact that every coin is meaningful. 1 baht isn’t worth much, but it’s still valuable. 20 baht is enough for a cheap meal. 20 pennies is enough to make your pocket heavy. And, unless you’ve got some greenbacks to go with that 20 cents, that’s about all 20 pennies is enough for.

Singapore was just a mess. They have more coins and bills than the United States. Coins in 1,5,10,20 and 50 cents, bills at 1, 2, 5, 10, 20, 50, 100… Singapore dollars. Talk about confusing!

And then there’s the Cambodian riel. The current exchange rate for the riel to the US dollar is about 4,000 to 1. And they have 100 riel bills. Yeah. That’s a bill for fourth of a cent. And they don’t have coins– or, rather, the riel takes the place of the coins, since most transactions are done in US dollars. It was rather weird being Cambodia, and using US dollars for every purchase, and getting my change in riel. At least they have the sense not to use the ridiculous system of American coins.

So. I love the rupee, just for being … almost adventurous. And I respect the Thai baht for making sense. And I wish– oh I wish– that America would finally buck up to inflation and get rid of that annoying penny. I must say, being penniless (heh, so to speak) for the last 6 months has been rather pleasant.

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To combat the recent influx of spam in the comments section, I’ve once again returned to Pliny for another round of updates.

I realize, last round, that many of you may have been scratching your head when I noted that you can edit your comments. Well, silly me, I somehow mixed up > with < (um, yeah), so that you would need to travel at least seven days into the past to be able to change your comments. That's fixed now. More to the point, anonymous posting is still allowed (although Pliny now has a configuration option to easily disable it) but I can now “nuke” a comment– delete it, and ban the IP of the person who posted it, with a single click. Hopefully, after I ban a couple IPs, it’ll stop being a problem. If the problem continues, I’ll start banning groups of IPs… and if that doesn’t fix the problem, well…

I attended recently an inter-faith dialog on topic of “the concept of God in Hinduism and Islam in the light of sacred scriptures,” sponsored by a Muslim educational group. In a loosely structured debate, Dr. Zakir Naik of the Islamic Research Foundation, a prominent Muslim scholar and orator, and Nobel-prize nominated Sri Sri Ravi Shankar (heh! what a great name!), well-known for both his Hindu leadership and international aid involvement– he’s the founder of several international NGOs.

It was a huge event– widely promoted in Bangalore, and televised internationally. I estimate that there were perhaps 100,000 people in attendance, mostly Muslims. Dr. Naik, from the Islamic perspective, spoke first. In short, he was remarkable: to stood and spoke forcefully and convincingly for fifty minutes in front of a crowd of 100,000 people. He quoted the Qu’ran in Arabic, before translating into English, and quoted the Vedas in Sanscrit, before also translating to English. He was exceptionally well-organized, using quotes, properly cited, from international sources and the sacred scriptures to support every point. He was very easy to follow, and commanded one’s complete attention. He a balanced view of both sides, in a thoroughly scholarly manner– and did it all without notes.

Unforunately, he wasn’t well matched. Although Sri Sri Ravi Shankar is an impressive individual– one with exceptional heart and compassion, he’s not a scholar, and his response was only marginally related to the topic, rather rambling and disorganized, and actually made very little mention of the sacred scriptures, except to quote them occasionally (heh, and NOT translate them into English). But one thing he said, in particular, stood out in my mind. “Thirty years ago,” he told the crowd, “religious tollerence was the goal. But tollerence is a feeble word. You tollerate something you don’t like. We need to go beyond tollerence and learn to love. We must see the commonness in everything, and celebrate the differences.”

Heh. I was much ammused: at one point, someone near the front of the crowd stood up and looked behind him, as though something interesting was happening at the back of the event. Like doing the wave, people behind him stood up and did similarly, and it spread its way to the back of the crowd– people standing up to see what everyone else was looking at. Which, of course, was nothing, but people are curious like that. =)

Most outstanding was spending an entire evening at a psedu-religious event, and never once was money mentioned. No mentions of donations, or support. No mention of tithes, or giving, or of god being poor. That impressed me, a lot.

But most poigniant– and perhaps one of the startling moments since my arrival in South-East Asia was the realization, after two hours of sitting in the crowd, that there was not a woman in the crowd! Or, rather my part of the crowd– the event had been entirely segregated by gender. ALL of the women who had come were seated in a walled-off section on the left-hand side. Proportionally, there were probably only 20,000 females (mostly vieled) in a crowd of 100,000, but… I don’t even know how to describe my reaction. HOW had I sat in the crowd for two hours and NOT noticed the complete absence of women? It wasn’t until the question and answer session began, and the chairman was explaining the position of the microphones– two for men, and two for the women– that I realized that the women were all in the partition to the left.

I can’t describe the effect this had on me. There’s been a number of cultural elements in India that have challenged my western notions, but most I had been at least partially prepared to deal with. I knew, for example, that many marriages in India were arranged. I didn’t understand that, for all intents and purposes, all marriages are arranged– and many are arranged entirely according to arbitary placement. In short, society randomly joins pairs of stranges, and bids them to be happy and multiply. I’m still trying to come to terms with that. But it wasn’t totally unexpected. But being at a huge, public event, and suddenly realizing that it was completely segregated by gender– that was genuinely startling. I’m sure I fail to convey the immensity of the event– how much space 100,000 chairs takes up (it was held outdoors, in the huge, open Palace Grounds (although from what they gain that appelation, I don’t know), and just how stark the division was. Not a woman in the crowd– all the women protected from the probing eyes of men by a tall, white cloth barrier. And by their veils– covering them from head to toe, save their eyes, hands and… toes.

I love chai tea. Three times a day. At least.

I love buying food on the street and having it served on a leaf.

I love that I know more Indians who love Iron Maiden than Americans.

I love being greeted when I walk down familiar streets.

and

I love being in a country that has more book stores than bars.

Actually… my phone number hasn’t changed. I just figured out what you need to dial from the United States to make my phone ring. Try: +91.9880.2394.90 or, from a landline, dial 011.91.9880.2394.90.

The phone system here in India– like a lot of other “systems” is kinda mess. I was trying to call a number in Delhi today, so I asked Vivek– “say, what’s the area code for Delhi.” “011,” he replied. Well, 011 didn’t work. So I asked him “I’m having some trouble with this.” “Oh, you need another number,” he replied. “Try … 2” “Oh. Two. Of course.” But then… adding a 2 between the area code and the phone number worked. Heh. So anyhow. I’m pretty sure that I have the right number, now.

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In other news… I’m just going to keep rubbing it in:
Bangalore: 84° / 59°
Bozeman: 23° / 31°

Mmm.

I’ve uploaded some photos from my first week in India.

The photos from Hyderabad are here:
http://www.eateggs.com/gallery/main.php?g2_view=core.ShowItem&g2_itemId=1298

Photos from Hampi are here:
http://www.eateggs.com/gallery/main.php?g2_view=core.ShowItem&g2_itemId=1330
The Hampi photos came out especially well. The color saturation of several photos has been increased, in addition to several photos being cropped. That aside, the photos are unaltered.