So I took a long walk today. Not that long, but long for this place. I had gone to Pizza Hut for dinner since all the other places were closed, it being Sunday and all. I ordered something different and it was not up to par, so I finally ordered my usual. That also was not up to par, but I took it all lightly and still had a good time. I drew my friend, the Dunkin' Donuts coffee flask. After the food, I stepped out and the twilight invited me for a walk to help clear my troubled mind. I was in that mood where one has been thinking a lot, feeling down, and still trying to be one's best friend by listening and exercising patience.

I thought about many things. I realized that the most important thing in that moment was living the moment as it came. And it came in whisper winds, darkening skies, and magnificent trees bathed in street light. I thought about many things during those moments. I was agitated. I felt distant from those people whom I thought were my good friends. And I wondered what the use of going back to Chicago would be. I had a job in Baltimore, calling me back. I had a great friend in Austin who would drop everything if I was coming to visit. I had a friend in Houston who meant so much to me. I had a friend in Detroit. One in Holland. Another in Denmark. Why Chicago, then? It still feels like home, nonetheless, with all its strife and toil.

Ah, the hard life. How much I long for it now. But I suppose it will come and I shall have enough of it to satisfy me soon.

So this is the first time away from Tai Chi class where I have continued to practice in a semi-intense way. All those other times, I would just practice the movements in a half-hearted attempt to keep myself in shape for when I would return. Yet even though I have continued to practice I feel that I have not improved very much since I left. Oh well. What is to be done? I can only try.

As for music, I have learned that I can lose myself in it and love the tiniest and sweetest of sounds. But I have always known that. I have learned that I can try anything new. Hm, no, I've always known that, too. Ah, here's something I truly have learned. I have seen Carnatic music in its native culture and therefore its original form. I think I have learned something of what it means to the people here. All of it disgusts me, but I did promise myself to withhold judgment. Until when? I suppose, until I have a clear way to express what it is that disgusts me.

I listened to the CD's that people had sent me over my stay here. Mostly just the ones that Nick sent me. But I also listened to Everything But the Girl, which was given to me by Robin Cox before I left. They were interesting, at least. Then, tired of sitting in one place all day, I went to Chill Thrill for some snacks. I took Nick's letters with me for lack of anything better to read. As I read them I remembered the first time reading them and wondered why I didn't reply the way I wanted to now. I also felt like talking to him again, just saying anything whatever was on my mind.

After I was done reading, I left and went for a little walk. I came to Indira Nagar, where the gym that I go to is located. I took a right at this big clearing I saw. There was a very wide road. I had seen this clearing many times before and found it interesting and decided today was the day to explore. At the end of this road was a village with a lot of village people sitting around and talking loudly and stray dogs everywhere. The road turned into a bridge that passed over a canal of very shallow, murky water. For some reason I found this bridge to be very odd and interesting. Many people were passing by the path that I walked, some of them wearing slacks and button-downs, which encouraged me to keep walking.

At the end of the bridge came a major highway perpendicular to the path I had been walking. All around was the putrid stench of sewage. In the distance the streetlight was the same colour as the flaming sunset, lighting up the tree behind it. Above me an immense structure loomed, what I thought to be a bridge of some sort. But I had never seen a bridge like it. It was so massive and its supporting pillars so wide and made not of concrete but of some metal that I thought I was in some strange different town.

In the dusk I could make out other strange things around me. At the highway, I headed back up toward the right--the direction from which I had been coming--walking along the sidewalk, which was made of square bricks that all had 2004 stamped in the center of them. Along my right ran the canal over which I had just passed, and the looming bridge over it. The highway looked to be pretty normal, like other highways I had seen around here. The traffic was thick and grew thicker as my walk wore on. The canal was more of a marsh than anything else.

Up ahead I came to a large white monstrosity of a building, made of concrete and the roof looking like it had been broken off. But I'm sure there was a roof, too high for me to see. Wirey spokes protruded where I thought the building's structure should have continued upward. I took the building to be abandoned. I could see through its open windows and doorways to its massive inner architecture. Stairs everywhere and wide, empty spaces. I was drawn to go inside and explore it, but I spotted some dark figures lurking about inside, and I decided that they were probably the rightful owners of this property. A few motorcycles were parked outside of the building along the sidewalk. I wondered what they could be doing inside. Perhaps discussing what to use the building for? To renovate it? Yes, I had this much time to think about this building, as it kept going, this massive, abandoned thing. Then I came upon what I figured to be the front entrance, which was marked by a sign that said "INDIRA NAGAR." What a weird title. Indira Nagar What? I thought.

Then through what I supposed to be the front doorways where doors perhaps once stood, I saw a chart that said "Time Table" and a ticket counter. It all looked abandoned, like some old train station that no one used anymore. I soon came to the end of the building and above, along the looming "bridge" an electric train passed, lit up with yellowish-green light. At least I thought it was electric. Maybe I hoped it was electric, longing for something similar to the El train of my college days. It was just like a normal train, populated, enough people to pour out of its sides. I wondered why the tracks for the train were elevated, though, rather than along the ground like the other trains I had seen in this area.

In the twilight I walked as fast as I could, not sure how far this road would continue going, but not looking to turn back the way I came. Eventually I ended up where I thought I would be, at a familiar intersection. For the first time it dawned upon me that I was actually a little frightened to get lost in this new place, not because I didn't think I could find my way, but because the people look upon me strangely, and may treat me in ways that I do not expect. Nowadays, I cease to look into anyone's eyes, as I usually do, as I don't want to invoke their ceaseless staring back at me. It annoys and sometimes disgusts me that they stare that way with no shame and no indication of the desire to communicate. Just bare voyeurism.

In the murkiness of the canal, I saw a man seated among thrush and broken concrete blocks and other rubble, scrubbing himself with soap. Yes, he was bathing, and doing a thorough job, too. I was so surprised that I felt bad for wanting to keep looking at him. He lives here? I thought. I guess it was a nice place for a home. Soon, though, I came upon a shack so well concealed in the shadows by its thatched, straw roof that I almost missed it. It appeared part of the landscape, so to speak. I assumed this to be the bathing man's humble abode. A truly humble one, just like all the other shacks I had seen, just like the shack that my old friend Abdul lives in.

As I neared the familiar intersection, the putrid stench of sewage that filled my lungs with repulsion began to die away. Apparently construction workers leave mounds of sand alongside buildings or sidewalks or roads that they have finished (for the time being) working on. And people just randomly sit on these mounds. They hang out, watching the people around them, just existing and breathing and resting. I always want to stare and take it all in, but when I do, people stare back at me, and I become an object of interest, rather than them remaining as the interesting objects. I become the observed rather than the observer.

There is nothing intersting about me. And yet isn't it odd that they stare at little ol' me when all around I see people bathing in the open, or taking a shit on the side of the road, crouched in position, or stopping for a leak on the side of the road into the thrush. I've seen so many shining arcs of urine soar through the air that I no longer find it fascinating. The voyeurism is directed at uninteresting people like me who are relatively normal in behavior, and yet stop at people who behave in more villagey ways, like those who release their bodily waste in public. But I can tell that people don't consider that kind of behavior normal or glamorous or anything. They see it in the same way that I see it. They just don't look. Perhaps they've learned not to look. But then why do they stare at me? It's strange. To not attract attention, I've also learned to only look with my eyes, not my head. If I turn my head, it's ever so slightly, just enough to let my eyes behold the object of interest. It's too bad, since I would so much like to walk around with a camera, but instead I must walk around like a hidden camera, storing all these things in my memory.

I think the smell of sewage, that strong putrid revolting stench, will forever be branded in my mind with the memory of India. This is the first place where I have smelled it so unceasingly and in the midst of such "Indian" things.