BACK TO DELHI
 

Soon we were in Delhi. The trip had been utterly painless, and our driver found us while we were still trying to make sure that we were at the place he had told us to meet him. As we headed out to the van, I saw what Indian coolies are capable of. Red-shirted men casually walked out of the station with 3 suitcases balanced on their heads and one in each hand. It was amazing. Vally said they can do 5 suitcases. We pulled out into the dense traffic. We were stopped at a light and as I looked out the drivers side window, I saw the an autorick was turning into our path. He hit us with a "bonk." No harm was done, and as we drove away we discussed the incident. It turns out that Vally and I had seen two completely different things. I had seen the driver, apparently unaware of us, turn into our path, and Vally had seen an unoccupied rick, its driver busy in an argument with someone else, roll into us. We arrived at the convent at midnight, happy to see Eugene. She had thoughtfully filled a bucket with hot water in case we wanted a bath, but we were too tired and too cold to do anything with it. She needed a spare quilt and it was kept under my bed. I had, in my usual need-to-know style, never considered the question of what was under my bed. She moved my mattress to the side, and exposed a hinged plywood box which I had evidently been sleeping on. She opened the lid and withdrew one of the quilts. After she left, I helped myself to another of the thick narrow quilts. I put it on top of my mattress. It made a significant difference in my comfort that night. We had two days left in India.

 

Zippers
 
 This might be a good time to tell you about "zippers." That was a term I invented for the phenomenon of men peeing at the side of the road. In Northern India it was absolutely routine. While driving, there was one every 5 minutes at least-standing facing away from the road, turning and zipping and occasionally squatting, since in some cultures men do not stand up to pee. There wasn't even any attempt to find a secluded place, just let fly wherever.

 

Last Morning in Delhi

Our next-to-last morning in India was perfectly normal, if you call attempting to sleep late in a Holy Cross convent somewhere near Delhi "normal." It was actually very noisy, a lot of weird scraping sounds which we later found out were from the chairs in the nursery school which was right above us. As we packed, we unloaded everything we could onto Eugene-shampoo, soap, a paperback collection of stories by Bailey White that I had just finished, socks, towels, the mosquito coil. We visited Eugene's school, bid everyone a fond farewell and, with Eugene, we climbed into our trusty white Mahruti with our trusty driver and headed for Delhi.

 

The Bahai Temple
 
 Eugene especially wanted us to see the world famous Bahai temple. This was not our first Bahai temple, since we had seen the world famous Bahai temple near Chicago, which was amazing. The one in Delhi looks like a cross between a lotus flower and the Gateway Arch in St. Louis. I mean that literally. It is shaped like an enormous lotus flower, petals and all (think water lily if you have no idea what a lotus looks like), with a skin made of stainless steel plates, exactly like the Arch (St. Louis term). At first glance it is spectacular, with blue reflecting ponds under each of the petals. It is set in a huge, open grassy area. I think we were at a disadvantage though because the last spectacular thing we had seen was the Taj Mahal and this did not come near it. Everyone had to put on shoe covers to walk inside, but they did not charge for them. In fact, this was one of the few places we had been where no one was trying to get money. There were even signs saying "No tipping." It was totally clean and well-maintained. We toured the temple, sitting down for awhile in silence in the huge chapel with its incredible high ceiling (the center of the lotus flower) and windows all around the periphery. We tried to tune into the feeling of the place and it was very similar to the feeling of the temple near Chicago. The energy felt chaotic and a little bit scary, not serene at all. When we went to the temple in Chicago, we knew little about Bahai and wondered if we would find its teachings attractive. There are a lot of very positive aspects to Bahai, for example, that it is a faith that stresses the equality of men and women of all races. But, in Chicago and in Delhi both, as we read the texts in the well-designed museum, we found that the Bahai God was more scary and awesome than a God of pure love. The energy in the chapels, in fact, fit perfectly with the God that was described in the museum exhibit.

 

Lunch in Delhi
 
 We had to be at the airport by 5 PM, so we were under time pressure. There was a restaurant that Eugene wanted to take us to called Nirula's. Actually it is a complex of restaurants, a fast food place and an ice cream parlor downstairs, and two restaurants upstairs, ours, the Pot Pourri and a Chinese restaurant. According to the guidebook, which I just read, the Pot Pourri "used to be somewhat of a traveller's Mecca but is now living off its reputation." The parking lot in front, sort of like in a strip mall, was jammed with cars, most of them parked in. Our driver stayed with the car, so it wasn't a problem. The restaurant was very crowded and we had to wait for a tiny table. Actually there were several people ahead of us, but Eugene, in her nun's sari, told them that we had a flight to catch so they put us ahead of them. Actually, Eugene told us, when she travels alone she wears a regular sari rather than one that identified her as a nun. She says that when she travels as a nun, people always want her to listen to and solve their problems. So she travels incognito. Originally, she wore a habit, which, from the photos I have seen consisted mainly of a head covering veil with the starched head collar, and a street-length dress. At some point, the order offered the possibility of wearing saris and everyone had to decide what they wanted to do. Eugene chose the sari but said that the decision was irrevocable, she could not go back. A couple of the sisters in her convent still wear habits.

The salad bar had about 20 items, all of them cold and all but two vegetarian. Most of them were unusual combinations of cut up fruits and vegetables and beans, and none of them involved lettuce. I think the dessert was rice pudding, a common dessert in India. I enjoyed it, but neither Vally nor Eugene had the salad bar. The atmosphere of the restaurant was a true blend of east and west, groups of subdued women in saris and mixed groups of Indians and westerners in western dress talking animatedly. We stuffed our faces and raced off to the airport. We got there about 20 minutes early, but no one was taking any chances. The total bill for all of the driving, including the trip to Agra, was 2000 rupees.