majnu ka tilla and woody allen.

it has been a while since i've written--here, that is. i've rediscovered writing by hand, and i like it, but the problem is, i'm thoroughly disorganized. i lose all my notebooks (not to metion my pens) and i always write out of order; i'll find a half-filled spiral bound in a random corner or bag or drawer and just start writing it in again and i never date anything, and therein lies the confusion. but sometimes i wonder if writing by hand helps me to connect to the part of myself that started writing when i was five years old. i think it does.

i'm in delhi and i keep confronting the feeling that i'm back in a place that i know. not that it's a bad feeling; it's just that i was starting to feel that i "know" kathmandu, and being here challenges that. walking down majnu ka tilla's main street this morning--not really a street, even, more of an alley--someone said in tibetan, who is she? and he was talking about me or he wasn't, but i turned my head to look at him and we made eye contact, and i wondered suddenly, how well can you know a place if you don't understand the converstions happening around you everyday? language is complicated. i see speakers of languages as insiders. it's a password, it's a ticket, it's a membership. but actually, it's not. look at all those foreign dharma students in nepal who speak fluent tibetan but don't have any tibetan friends. i need to complicate my undertandings of insider-ness, maybe.

i'm sick. i have a cold which, in my life, always means i have the flu, too. i've been treating it with room service and amerian movies on t.v. last night was thenthuk and dirty dancing 2 (have you seen that movie? it's terrible). this morning was chai, tibetan bread, and woody allen. match point. i hadn't seen it before. it was good. i think i'm suffering from inertia. my students are gone; we brought them to the airport a couple of nights ago, and this small part of me wished i were getting on the flight, too. there's a feeling of release that happens when i fly back to the states. or maybe it's a feeling of superiority. maybe it's a feeling of giving-up-the-fight; surrendering. it usually only lasts for the duration of the trip home. then i'm back in the states and washed in the understanding that i am-myself-everywhere. india, nepal, america--i take me with me. but i can imagine sinking into an airplane seat, reading junk novels and eating junk food. it could be relaxing.

instead, i'm going to dharamsala on the over night bus tonight. there's no agenda. okay, there are a million tiny agendas. i'm starting to feel light headed from this cold and from staring at a computer screen. maybe it's time for another round of room service and t.v. also, i need to buy a shawl for the bus. it's going to be freezing in mcleod.

someone just walked into this internet cafe who i know. knowing a place is knowing people, so i guess i know this place.

i miss you guys,
e.