Cow

Just walking down the main street on way for food, so busy even the cows were out shopping...and suddenly today, a host of stalls selling nothing but water pistols..,,.some with backack reservoirs.....its about to kick off, the weekend is upon us and the full moon cometh...and amidst all of this a miserable Italian who just been hit a light glancing blow from a water bomb...I don't like this holi, he said, its stupid. Does this wash out? We indulged in momentary schadenfreude at his next few days....he disappeared along the ghats where a kid appeared out of a doorway and, in an explosion of pink upon back, compounded his misery.....

And so...the tale of Vishnu towers continues apace...after waking to realise that everything was damp down in the dungeon...it was time to move rooms....I hoped, having only just held back from knocking on Milo's door and begging the spare bed...the rooms cause wasn't helped by the two cockroaches which clambered off from under the clothes on the bed...I can't stay in that room, I said....hmmm, came the reply....there's a river running through it, I offered, there's a lake forming, the rooms a disaster....hmm,sigh...OK. you go in dorm, maybe one night..no worries....and so I sat down to attempt to get yesterdys blip up, soon to be joined by a green looking Jens, lurgy not holi green....you, said ajay the manager pointing at him, move room today. Upstairs, room ten...Jens looked imploringly at him, I'm sick, I don't want to move....you didn't say there was a room, I whined....room ten, upstairs. You know price...I smiled, the tide was turning....yes, I gleefully said, I know the price he paid, so....ajay groaned, OK OK you have for five hundred...three different beds and it was still only 0900...and I'd forgotten the monkeys which compete for the roof with us, wander into your room if you leave the door open..hmm...challenging....I just couldn't recommend this place highly enough....quite possibly the most enjoyable place I've ever stayed...

The never ending jam had a morning session and then I wandered along for coffee and WiFi, coming across the most gruesome sight yet....

And an oddly quiet day ensued. I think that we've now all been here long enough to be getting used to the place and vice versa. Now there's a very gentle play, you become recognised by the sellers, they know you won't buy but that you'll join in the craic...and so it went today...the kids who sell postcards and candles know us and so just wander over, occasionally berate us...or hit us...but it seems like a kind of acceptance....same with the boatmen....there's a change these last days...and the drug dealers have departed the scene, which is a relief....

And I find myself, still, several times a day around the ghats just sighing, struck once again by the incessant subtly changing beauty of this place. Just before attempting my blip I stood on the terrace...the jam just ending...Milo departed half an hour before aj and I played a bit more u til after a deadbeat attempt at waits' on the nickel he stopped, doubled over his guitar and spent the next few minutes laughing, looking up he muttered, I can't do this anymore, shook his head, smiled and stumbled to his feet.....and gazed out along the Ganges...the light is hazed, the horizon uncertain...left and right a curve of reflected lights against blueblack tones of sky and water...it seems that at points this place becomes enmeshed with absurd dreams...it's certainly going to odd to leave, odd to face reality again...but for the next days...holi is coming...

And that's it. We're all getting ready for holi. We have our water pistols, colours etc. I think we need some bombs also....

And, as Mr John asked for colour....

Have more to put on flickr but connection, and time, haven't allowed..,,maybe before i leave...off to haridwar after holi...

And later slightly hacked off that yesterdays blip was kicked out of the nature and wildlife group....wondering how an underground river fails as nature....let's see how this one does;-)