Acute Aesthetic

Dear dedicated reader,

My shifting perspective is perhaps being influenced by my travel mate: Kate, a now itinerant artist, moves through the world with an acute sense of the aesthetic and I believe that this tendency is rubbing off on me as I wonder at the new visual feast around me. India itself possesses an incredibly varied terrain, but I myself have not seen much of it these past few months as I’ve bicycled Madhi Road over and over again. Much of India’s visual symbolism I’ve internalized and can now translate easily into meaning. Being in a new country, despite its many similarities, has brought with it new symbolism for the same meanings and I find myself staring wonderingly at the strange blend of Indian and East Asian architecture I am presented with, not to mention the world that contains them.

First, I am watching the prayer flags above a towering Tibetan stupa flutter and the prayer wheels lining its base spin, their inert prayers tactilely activated by the devoted and the curious and released in a clockwise fashion out over the open Kathmandu valley, rising above the shadowed mountains which line its edges and freed into the snow capped universe.

Then, I am sitting in a quiet courtyard in the village of Patan while Kate works in her sketchbook. I listen and watch as two Nepalese girls quietly and unself-consciously choreograph a dance to a popular Hindi film song. Above them, old crumblingly sturdy brick buildings continue their centuries old march onward with pigeon infested garlic hanging to dry from their eaves. Around their doorsteps, ducks and dogs and goats gather for a kind of quotidian worship of the hand that feeds them and their rooftop rose gardens sway lightly in soft valley breeze.

Wandering on, I stop for a moment outside a courtyard of the same town and watch surreptitiously from behind a pillar as an old Nepalese woman shovels rice in a fierce and determined way. She brings her shovel slowly back, picks up a bundle and then throws it in a flinging motion across the courtyard where it scatters on a pile next to a large spread of rice drying in the sun, waiting for feet to sift lightly through it, a practical prayer in each grainy step.

While Kate makes quick, hurried sketches of figures which she observes in the bustling of Patan’s touristy Durbar Square, I find myself making similar quick sketches in my head but, lacking Kate’s practiced skill, with words. I watch as an Anglo of ambiguous origin (Italy? Britain? South America? We can only guess) himself sketches along with a gaggle of thrilled Nepalese children to whom he’s given the use of a set of colored pencils. They eagerly adore his sketches and show him theirs proudly. His smile invites others to join and to me the resulting tableau looks almost biblical. Occasionally as I watch, he looks up, we make eye contact, and I look away, embarrassed by my casual staring. As soon as I think he’s not looking, I look back, fascinated by the childrens’ fascination with him.

In these moments that I’ve described, I’ve never felt more aware of the kind of voyeurism that is tourism. Observing these small, private interactions feels too intimate, more intimate than even when I see such things in Kadod. I think the difference comes in the egalitarianism of it: in Kadod, my life is as up for scrutiny as anyone else’s, as the frequent intrusions on our American constructed privacy often demonstrate. Here, with my hotel room and my camera and my own ambiguous origin, I am inscrutable beyond my immediate exterior and my wide, constantly gawking eyes.

It just doesn’t seem fair. And yet, I can’t look away.

Best,
Cat

P.S. I'm posting this in the middle of our morning watching of the election coverage. What a luxury to be able to watch full coverage outside your own country (albeit 9 hours and 45 minutes ahead) Go Obama Go!