The Thing with the Ticking Thursday, Aug 28 2008

     I drive Husband crazy with my eternal quest for the Perfect Sleeping Environment. I must have the following things in order to have a very good night’s sleep: (in no particular order, they are all equally important):

     1. Dark – Lots of dark. I spent the night at this girl’s house once in high school and she and her sister had applied copious amounts of tin foil to their bedroom windows such that when the door was closed and the lights turned off, there was no seeing anything. Your eyes never adjusted. I spent half the night trying to see my hand in front of my face and trying not to think about going to the bathroom since I couldn’t see the door or the two other people in the room. It was great.

     2. Quiet – I enjoy a little quiet music or ocean waves at first, but then can we just turn off everything? Husband likes the whir of fans. I feel like the Grinch when complaining about those loud Whoos. “If there’s one thing I hate…oh the noise, noise, noise noise!”

     3. Blankets – I’m like Goldilocks here. Can’t be too thick or too thin, it has to be juuuuust right.

     4. Temperature – I think you’ll all agree with me that a cold room is not only healthier but more conducive to sleep.

     Many times, as a guest in other people’s homes, I have slept in guest rooms where the hosts have placed a timepiece that insists on ticking. Or they have a conveniently located DVD player attached to the guest TV that creates a floodlight-like experience in a darkened room.

    When I went to India for my friend’s wedding, I slept in her bedroom and she slept in the guest room. Darkness wasn’t a problem in the southern India in the middle of a teeny town. But there was a clock. It was an innocuous eighties-style clock, gold plastic and a little gold plastic pendulum. The first night I sat there in bed wishing I could just fall asleep but like the ever-beating heart in Poe’s story, it just got louder and louder. Finally, I got up and pulled it off the wall intending to find a new home for it. There were no dresser drawers, no places to put it. I finally found a nail in the en suite bathroom which didn’t exactly fit the clock’s hanger hook thingy, but it was 1 a.m. and I was fed up with it.

     My intention was to return the clock to its original position first thing in the morning and move it every night. At some point that first night, I was awoken out of a sound sleep by a noise. Oh the noise! In my curry-induced stupor I fell back to sleep, not realizing it was the samurai clock leaping off the wall in the shame that I had dismissed it to the bathroom.

    Now I’d done it. Broken my host’s bedroom clock. How typically American of me. I put the pieces on the bed and went to shower thinking of a way to politely explain my accident. While I was in the shower, the housekeeper, a young woman who would later inquire anxiously about the location of my other ankle bracelet (I had one one that my mom gave me before I left but apparently only Indian prostitutes wear just one anklet…), had cleaned the room – made the bed, swept the floor…and disposed of the clock.

     I have no idea what they thought about the clock incident. I told my friend I broke it and she laughingly dismissed it. I can’t imagine what the housekeeper told the cook or my friend’s mother. “I found this clock destroyed in pieces on the bathroom floor. Clearly the American hates clocks and wishes to break them.”

     In a hotel room in Miami earlier this year, I was on a business trip and staying and a fancy schmancy hotel. (How fancy schmancy? Well, Avril Levigne was staying there at the same time and I got shooed away by her bodyguard. How’s that for fancy?) The smoke detector had an obnoxiously bright light, green and blinky, that was like something from a landing strip. Thinking of course that I’d just remove it before I left, I climbed up on the dresser and applied one of my emergency band aids to the blinking light. Verrrry effective. I wonder if anybody has noticed that the smoke alarm seems to have a boo boo…because I forgot to remove it.

 

 

**Amusing side note: My spam blocker caught this gem after I posted the above:

Direct contact with ticks frequently results in tick infestation.

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Things I Learned in India Wednesday, Jul 30 2008

     Several years ago I went to India for three weeks to attend a friend’s wedding. (Yes, I know you saw that episode of Seinfeld.) I was in graduate school at the time, getting an MA in Literature and this lovely girl was in my class. We got to be close and she invited me to her wedding in southern India.  My feeling was that she had offered me a place to stay with her family and her friend so why the heck wouldn’t I go? Even though I had to spend $1,500 on a new transmission two months before I left… Even though I would be traveling to the other side of the world by myself… Even though I would be the tallest whitest person there… I went. I was looking through my photo album the other day and I had written some things down that I should have taken with me, which I’ll add here, but I should have also written more about what I learned.

     1. When you’ve boarded the plane to Detroit and are just settling the monster butterflies in your stomach and you’re trying to look like a savvy world traveling adult and your mother comes flying down the aisle dragging behind her a small Indian woman after having persuaded the flight attendants to delay closing the plane so that she (your mother) can point out that this woman’s husband is going to Mumbai just like you and tells you you should follow along with him so you don’t get lost/abducted/robbed/mugged/curried by Krishna-knows-what in that foreign airport….thank her kindly and acknowledge you know her. Do not squinch down in the seat without making eye contact and mumble “Thanks,” shaking your head in embarrassment until she and the Indian woman she dragged aboard are off the aircraft.

     2. Your mom was right about tagging along with a native. Upon reaching India, if you are indeed a single lady travelling alone, do find an Indian family who will take you under their wings. Otherwise, you won’t have anyone to defend you against the very helpful Indian porters will snatch up your luggage before you can tell them you’re actually going to Chennai, not Goa, and then you’ll be in a real pickle.

     3. It doesn’t matter if you try to blend in with the locals if you are in a small town, you will never ever blend in. I was clearly the tallest (I’m 5′ 6″) whitest (I think this complexion is referred to as Consumptive) person the tiny town had ever seen and I finally got to know what it was like to be a celebrity.

     4. You cannot possibly eat rice and curry for every meal unless you are very used to it. So when your friend’s mother kindly purchases corn flakes and has the help heat the milk for you (because it isn’t pasteurized), you will eat it and be grateful, even if you are eating rice and curry alongside it. You will also suck down the Coca-Cola she purchased as well, although Ribena is pretty tasty.

     5. It’s not as hot as you think it will be. September in south India was the end of the monsoon season and quite comfortable for a girl raised in the allmight oppressive heat and humidity of the Ohio River Valley.

     6. When in India, you may sleep with your friends’ friends and your friends’ cousins. Picture this: a train built during the British colonization of India with no air conditioning crammed to the gills with passengers, including the bride’s family and most of her friends and their families. It’s 10:30 pm and you still have 7 hours to go until you reach Chennai. Your friend’s best friend finds you in your little sleeping berth and explains she has given up her berth to someone’s grandmother and says she will be bunking with you. Conundrum! Did Emily Post cover etiquette for such a situation? What’s the proper procedure for spooning your friend’s friend on a train in India?

     7.  If you tell them you like spicy food, they will not believe you. My friend’s household help, a darling old man who had served the family for two generations, kept making the chai tea weaker and weaker until one morning it was nothing more than warm milk. He also prepared a separate dinner for me which was “not so hot.” Honestly, I love spicy food and insisting I like it spicier than this was kind of embarrassing.

     8. Things you should take with you to India:

     Photos of your family. Indians are big on family and my friend’s friend’s family could not believe that I lived alone but were reassured that my sister still lived with our parents. I wanted to show them where I come from.

     Gifts for your hosts. This applies anywhere, actually. I brought several coffee table books with large pictures of my hometown and home state and a cookbook for the bride to remember her time in my city.

     Lots of clothes. The laundry facilities I encountered were unable to keep up with the clothes I sweat in/spilled curry on/got wet. 147% humidity means…stuff doesn’t dry quickly.

     9. Like speaking the language of the country you visit, wearing the clothing of the country is a good thing to do. It shows you’re trying to experience the culture in all its facets. Ladies, wearing a sari is just like wearing a dress and don’t let them talk you out of the gorgeous silk one because its “too heavy.” Nonsense. I wish I’d gone for the silver and blue silk but I do love my green and gold Bengal cotton.

     10. You’ll get used to the traffic, where signals are optional, honking is mandatory, and you feel like you’re going to be in a terrible crash every time you get in a vehicle. Relax. It’s fine.

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