Welcome to the Hotel California

Mirrors on the ceiling,
The pink champagne on ice
And she said 'We are all just prisoners here, of our own device'
And in the master's chambers,
They gathered for the feast
They stab it with their steely knives,
But they just can't kill the beast


The price of living in the ski station and earning money for future trips is hard work. For a week I was able to live my vision of a tamer version of Magenta from the Rocky Horror Picture Show. Then I had to start looking like I mean business. When the supervisors had discovered the special abilities of all (which means, both) the runner-girls, it was made my main task to carry everything heavy that needed to be carried, at top speed and smiling, for hours and weeks and weeks on end. Along with the enforcement of this new subspecialization, my short-sleeved, red-lipped, tight-skirted French maid costume was changed for the official monkey suit that made me look like a gorilla in a skirt.

How to prepare onself for military service


You know those cute candles on every step of the stairs, on the tables and shelves, that make the atmosphere indoors so romantically brilliant? My lung capacity went up by X0% due to blowing out 102 candles every evening for two months.

And how do they get the forks so shiny? My fingers went coarse while I was busy becoming the Mistress Cutlery Polisher of the restaurant and I will probably stink of vinegar for the rest of my life.

My biceps have gone up two sizes and support well the wrists that masterfully balance 14 big wine glasses on one tray. I'm astonished at myself if I compare it to the first week when I sloshed a client with beer splurting out of the lonely Leffe bottle that I dropped off the tray.

I have a PhD in serving bread with an oversized pair of fork and spoon. Obtaining it was like a nightly circus school: invariably, I made the little buns and minibaguettes fly across the restaurant or bounce merrily on the tables between wine glasses, indecisive whether to land on the bread plate of the glam mister or the glam misses. The visual circus was always accompanied by the soundtrack of me laughing and overusing descriptive phrases like Oops! or Ooh-la-la! Les baguettes, elles veulent sauter aujourd'hui!


I can speak English with a slight French accent to confuse Estonian customers. Deceiving them into not realizing that I can spy on their conversations wasn't much fun though, because they didn't hold any conversations. To compensate for boredom, they grabbed the bread with their hands like the tiniest of the French children often used to, saving me from the eternal Oops I dropped the bread! game. Unfortunately, the morning when I was off, I missed an entertaining opportunity to drop a comment in the lines of Pole paha... Instead, it was my colleague who was shocked the whole day after having stumbled upon a naked guy walking out of shower while she was serving them breakfast in the room. I would have laughed and saved the story for my great grand children.

By some strange twist of fate I always manage to find the young managers tripping on power or else they are simply too numerous to efficiently avoid them. This job did not spare me either, pushing me constantly into a verbal fight with a certain Napoleon who was sporadically exploding and switching between Bonaparte and Dynamite. Mostly I had to battle for my rights of getting some sleeping hours at nights or a rare 20-second break between hours of racing around with heavy loads. Needless to say, I always lost, for he obviously outranked me in the line of command. Often it seemed to me that the necessity of having me (or anyone for that matter) there and the quality of my work was measured more by how I managed to make myself look busy on the rare moments of inactivity than by how much I sweated for the rest of the 45-55h working hours of the week. Also, I learned to switch off my brain. Any time I failed to do so and applied thinking - or, god forbid, initiative - I got in trouble. For all this training I consider myself experienced enough to be ready for serving my time in the French Foreign Legion.

Last thing I remember, I was
Running for the door
I had to find the passage back
To the place I was before
'Relax,' said the night man,
'We are programmed to receive.
You can check-out any time you like,
But you can never leave!'


Not the least important new skill obtained: I learned to make the time go past. The French Foreign Legion will have to fight the guardians of the Tower of London for me, as I am now fit for both. The traditional French style 5-star hotel means that in those moments of boredom with nothing to do and no supervisor around in need of convincing that we're oh-so-very-busy, we were still required to stand still as if having swallowed a long hard stick. No leaning. No crossing hands. No crossing legs. No lost look in the eyes or else sanctions in the shape of Napoleonic explosions shall proceed. Sir, I'm here only if and when you need me, sir. Otherwise I do not exist, sir attitude. A side remark: who would tip a waitress who doesn't exist? Not too many people.

Just a little appetizer

Three months of my life, spent in the Alps as a French maid, has been a fast and intensive ride. These last moments of the ski season I spend creeping along the walls at night to find internet connection; this post has been written, sitting under cover of a fir tree in some hotel's garden... all the things I must do to keep you entertained! Right after it's finished, I will sneak past my sleeping flatmate to drop off my tiny shiny black friend and then sneak back out to continue jumping over the fences (just for practice) and create some more substance for stories to come in the future.

Probably soon after I'm back from Morocco (or, with lots of luck, ealier), you'll get a full report of my winter in Val d'Isère. Until then, enjoy your spring!

---

The night is nice here in the mountains; in the middle of this tiny metropol, there's still loads of nature: a marmot just walked past and didn't even notice me. I can consider myself safe from the drunk snowboarders hoarding by.

The skies of Scotland

Edinburgh, it was: Hogmanay with friends, fireworks, flying chinese lanterns, whisky, chips and not to forget the ceilidh with flying people and gallons of sweat! And men in kilts. Burns Night with bagpipes, haggis (I still stick to the veggie version, thanks), neeps and tatties, odes to lassies and laddies, to the (computer) mousie and to Rabbie himself. And more men in kilts. Bedlam theatre, various plays and rehearsals. Pubs and bins. Creepy and cool Ravenloftish architecture. Deep fried Mars bars - the magic treat with a reverse yuk-yum-effect. Mr. Whisky in every shape and size, such as whipped into cream, heated with honey or simply the good auld wee dram. And even more men in kilts and more bagpipes.


While I passed a good part of the month staring at a computer screen, thinking and typing until my brain and fingers went sore and my back grew a hunch, I somehow still managed to mount a hill or two every now and then. When we cycled up that first horrible mountain in Norway, Alice suddenly yelled out "This is like Scotland!". Now in Scotland it was my turn to scream "This is like Norway!" or at least like the first smooth mossy hills of Norway with rare patches of snow on it. The wind though managed to outperform the Sognefjellsvegen gusts that nearly blew me and my stallion off the road in July. A true Scottish gale will make an anchor a dire necessity for little girls, everyone else must man up and stay in the center of the hill.


And finally - the unforgettable crawling spaniard, featured first in La Ciotat about a year ago, who this time promptly decided to mimic the celebrities who leave their handprints on pavements and briefly planted his teeth into the ice of the Pentland hills. The teeth won 1:0.


Cheerio!

Coordinates: somewhere near Dharali

First, 12h to the North and 2500m towards the sky in public transport...

...and then 5h and 1200 more metres straight up on foot.

Flopping around in a pinkish haze

The other Bigs of the Himalayas

All distances are incredibly big and measured not it metric but in time.

Rivers are big.
Pine cones are enormous.
Cultural differences with Europeans are huge.

Thorns of thorny bushes are BIG

Since childhood I know that raspberry brush stings and to avoid scratching it's better not to make too sudden a movement when picking berries. In France I made a new enemy when on several unfortunate occasions I bumped into and made "friends" with raspberry's big bad brother the blackberry. By now I know better than to run into the bushes too hastily without checking out the territory first. In the Indian Himalayas though I had a chance to bump into their even bigger and badder uncle - and that one's ot to be messed with. I pray that I never have to make a personal encounter with their godfather, in whichever remote corner of the world he might be lurking.


There I was, looking for a way downhill and picking paths - wherever I could find one - leading in the general direction of gravitation at any possible angle short of a freefall. For a considerable distance I followed a dry stream bed, scrambling down across loose rocks. The plan was good but it didn't take me all the way down for soon this path too was blocked by thickly entwined overgrowth hanging across from both sides. I didn't fancy crawling through the most vicious combination of stinging nettles and thorny bushes on earth.

The only alternative route meant serious bushwhacking. I felt like a tiny rabbit, popping my rucksack through gaps between branches and then wriggling through myself; or sliding on my back on loose rocks under bushes and generally moving much too carefully and slowly to get out of there before dark. I got whiplased by monstrous inch-thick stalks of stinging nettle armed with overgrown spikes that hurt like hell and grabbed by the biggest thorns I have ever seen attached to a branch. My efforts were futile. Finally on the verge of desperation, stuck in the middle of some tangled mesh of vegetation, hands up as if held at gunpoint and too scared to move, I fished my jacket carefully out of my rucksack, put it on in slow motion and then, covered head to bum with thick gore-tex, simply forced my way through to the clear ground.

Another experience gained.


How I ended up in this jungle in the first place, is the usual story. It started with a brisk walk up the first steep grassy hill at sight, while local fauna kept itself busy, grabbing my legs as means of cheap transportation to new seeding grounds. Since it was my first time being alone off-road in the mountains, it didn't really occur to me that if I need to use my hands for support on the ascent then descent by the same route would be nearly impossible.


It took me three hours to climb up before reaching the heavenly spheres of no other sounds but my own footsteps and the wind in the treetops. Such total silence took me by pleasant surprise. Though I had missed the calm of Northern Europe, I couldn't quite remember any more how it feels like. Back again in Europe, I find the actual noise levels of Indian towns hard to remember, but I haven't forgotten how deeply the contrast struck me when I first stepped out of civilization that day.


The magnifiscent views that rolled out in front of me were instant creators of peace of mind. All of them for me, me and only me! Who would need TV until there are sunny mountains to climb and look at? I never wanted to go back into the town, but sadly I always needed to. What bitter regret I felt, thinking of my lack of trekking equipment - the fact that nailed me to the spot and prevented me from doing anything more ambitious than daytrips. Next time, I will sacrifice the pleasures of travelling lightly and bring a heavy rucksack full of equipment to allow me to stay outdoors for as long as I feel like.

Despite their best efforts, a few thorny bushes didn't stand a chance against those awesome views.

Silence covered the sky

I would pass my time, sitting on a chair on my hotel balcony, soaking in the details of the summits, guessing what it would feel like to be there, imagining how small I would be;

watching the sunlight's angle change, the same clouds build up every day before sunset and fade away before darkness falls; watching the color of the incredibly clear sky change a hundred times over;

watching the dark cold shadow creep slowly up the mountain side, menacing... covering already half the mountain, it transforms the friendly summit shining in warm sunlight into a hungry bloodthirsty beast. Night has a different meaning out there.

Traditsioonide lipu lehvides: 2010

Aasta 2010 oli vägev. Muuhulgas jõudsin ma sel aastal ka raamatuid lugeda. Uskumatu? Selle nimekirja põhjal, mis on siin põhiliselt mu enda jaoks, võin kommenteerida, soovitada, kritiseerida - ja mõningaid harvu eksemplare, mis veel minu valduses, ka edasi kinkida.

Esimesel poolaastal Prantsusmaal magistritööle lisaks:
1. A. & B. Strugatski: "Hukkunud alpinisti" hotell
2. I. Asimov: Igaviku lõpp
3. S. King: Lisey lugu

Jaanipäeva kanti, Eestis:
4. B. Rajnov: Surra tohib vaid äärmisel juhul

Juulis ja augustis Norras ja Soomes rattasõidu kõrvale:
5. Rachel Gibson: Sex, lies and online dating
6. Neil Strauss: Emergency
7. Noam Chomsky: Secrets, lies and democracy
8. Khaled Hosseini: Kite runner

Vahepeal olin jälle korraks Eestis:
9. Pierre Boulle: Ahvide planeet

Septembris-oktoobris, tagasi Prantsusmaal:
10. Leo Tolstoi: War and peace
11. Amitav Ghosh: The hungry tide
12. JohnJoe McFadden: Quantum Evolution
13. Belle de Jour: Belle's Best Bits

Okt-nov-dets Indias:
14. Neil Strauss: The Game
15. Robin Sharma: The monk who sold his Ferrari
16. Anatoli Boukreev & G. Weston DeWalt: The Climb: Tragic ambitions on Everest
17. Lucy Edge: Yoga school dropout
18. Joe Simpson: Touching the void
19. Joe Simpson: Storms of silence
20. Henri Charrière: Papillon
21. Neil Gaiman: Neverwhere
22. Joseph Heller: Catch-22

Ning jõulude paiku Eestis ja lõpuks Šotimaal oli nii põnev, et lugeda ei jõudnud.

Kaks aastat edasi, kilomeetreid lugemata

Olen kahe aastaga päris pika maa maha käinud (aga ka jooksnud, vändanud, sõitnud, lennanud jne). Pilt on sootuks teine nii seest- kui väljastpool vaadates ning võrdlemise võimalikkuseks puudub piisav hulk ühisnäitajaid. Vaid linnuke oksal jääb samaks.

Peeking in through random doorways

With the world all upside down, inside out and the boundaries between private and public property a bit hazy for an untrained eye, you could be walking on a village street that winds through everyone's backyard or step through an innocent looking archway to end up unexpectedly in somebody's bedroom. Similarly, a door that was menacing at first sight might suddenly crack open and welcome strangers into a friendly temple.

It's not easy to make sense of it. Catlike exploration by peeking around corners and stepping in through random doorways might help some. It's an interesting world, how else would you discover it?

The sky is always bluer on the other side

"Nature is not a place to visit - it is our home", says a signpost next to the road up from the lower Dharamsala to McLeod Ganj. Taking the tip, we went to explore our home more profoundly.

We set off before dusk for the 3-4 hour walk up to Triund looming above McLeod Ganj. We barely managed to crawl halfway up through the tiny village before the sun rose from behind the ragged horizon. Cheeks flushed, sweating and breathing heavily, we sat down for the first breakfast, munching on our usual round Tibetan breads bought from a certain old man at a certain street corner.



Estimating another 3 and half hours at the same pace, we soon took another break on the cross-roads, or rather the cross-paths, making friends with a pack of dogs who decided to join our gang for the way up. Numerous resting stops followed, the longest and the nicest one was half way up, with guitar music and chai, under a considerably bluer sky than before. Still, it couldn't bare the comparison with Triund - the actual mountain top.


As for provisions, worrying or carrying extra is unnecessary: there are several tea stalls on the way up to the summit, one every half-hour or so. One of them sells tissue packs, named "Estonia". Commenting on that memorable event, I learned from the guy in the booth that the day before some other estonians had been laughing at it too. There's an estonian in every port, they used to say back in the old days. There's an estonian on every mountain top, I should add to make it more contemporary.



It was a strenuous walk on a well established path winding through the patches of ancient forest as well as out in the open, but always staying within the limits of moderate exercise. With the pretty views, beautiful weather and in good company, the time passed surprisingly fast. The clear air and closeness of those snowy summits (which I had been staring at down in the village for over a week) were more than a fare prize for the hours of trekking.


With the Southern sun fiercly blazing, the daytime weather was still quite warm and dry in mid-October, although a week before there had been a snow-storm up on Triund, transforming into a rainstorm 1500m lower in Dharamsala.

When talking about the Himalayas I find it hard to speak without overusing clichés. Whether the grass is always greener on the other side will depend on the season of a given spot in the mountains, the climate zones change very fast with the hight and whatnot. However, there is no doubt as to the sky being bluer than in my wildest dreams.

Miserable failure in the staring contest

How many Indians does it take to change a light bulb?


The correct answer is: as many as can be found loitering nearby, bored. They're a friendly crowd and like to give each other a helping hand. About the same goes for producing a pancake in a one-table restaurant - father cooks, the youngest son washes a plate, his brother polishes a cup, their nephew greases a spoon and the oldest son waiters. You'd better believe me when I say that there are always plenty of lanky men around doing nothing - as for women, they are hidden away on hard physical labour while making an effort to stay pretty, wearing make-up, colorful saris and tons of family jewels.

How many Indians does it take to explain the location of a bus to a Western girl?


The equation is about the same, multiplied by the factor of boredom and divided by the size of the town, giving a result somewhere between thirty and fifty. Not less, because obviously nobody wants to be the one to miss the spectable; and not more, because fifty men surrounding the traveller would be a dense enough bunch to block the view on the object of interest. Most of them help by staring, wide-mouthed (literally). Thinking back, it's quite funny, but at the time I went through a whole scale of negative emotions sometimes leading to unusual social experiments, including staring back or pointing and laughing back when (un)appropriate.

Needless to say, I still miserably failed the (inter)national staring contest. I can assure you that even the worst attention-seeking freaks would eventually freak out! From then onwards, I've symphatised with celebrities. So when I kind of accidentally slapped the thousandth randomer who tried to force his camera up my nose in the hopes of getting a photo of that wierd creature, I decided to pack my bag and hide in the mountains. Eventually, I failed miserably even in that, but first I got to have some awesome adventures and a great time in the Himalayas.

Staring aside, I felt quite safe, strolling on narrow back alleys of narrow back alleys of crowded streets of unknown villages or even New Delhi. I felt particularly comfortable after I had figured out that I'm an alien and therefore, that different social rules apply to me. I could neither be considered a man nor a woman - for, in India, I resemble neither of them too much. So, anomaly that I was, I ventured around joyously, unravelling the mysteries of that mysteriously mystic culture until I understood a lot more about them that they did about me.

Ear cleaning, ma'am?

There is chaos all around, but in an organized kind of way - once you start getting the system. Walking on the streets of Haridwar feels like being in a movie about India. The air is hazy with the mix of dust, mist and smoke, boiled to around 30 degrees by the hot sun and the blue sky is nowhere to be seen - it is all yellowish white.


Getting somewhere means wiggling through the narrow strip between shops and traffic, dodging oncoming pedestrians. On one side a slow colourful maelstrom of vehicles of all kinds, powered by men, animals or petrol, honking their way through the rickshaw jam with pimped-up musical horns mixed with jangling Hindi pop music; on the other side: coal, socks, bangles, cucumbers, toothbrushes, offerings, buckets - you name it, we've got it! Ear wax removal? Shoe shining? Chai? You name it, we'll do it! There is no colour missing on any section of the market street and every imaginable service has someone to offer it. I personally didn't plan on letting an Indian boy anywhere near enough to poke around in my ears but I did see him in action from a safe distance. Dirty ears, ma'am! is a catchy phrase, I must admit.


All life happens on the streets. A shop, workshop or a restaurant usually means a hole in the wall, stacked with merchandise. Bananas jostle around on a cart as well as apples, papayas, potatoes along with various unidentifiable fruits and veggies. On the riverside you can get plastic bottles to scoop out some purifying Ganga water and take it home with you. I have no idea what they do with it - drink, wash or do whatever it takes to finally catch that longed-for cholera. Purifying means different things for us and them.



Can it possibly get any more colourful? Yes, it can! Especially at Diwali time - the Hindu New Year's celebrations. If adding more colours would make no more difference, there's always tinsel! And after you've done what you can with tinsel - fireworks! Our team of four western giants had trouble finding a safe enough way back to the hotel. In fact, it was impossible to find since the fireworks exploded constantly all around us at ground level so that the overall impression was that of a warzone. Thus we resigned and picked the street we already knew (and knew to fear) - the riverside - and made our way through it under a thick smoke blanket.


There's nothing quite like running from car to car, taking cover and screaming delightedly after throwing aside the fear for one's life because there's no way of coming out of it alive anyway. Might as well enjoy the ride! Our enjoyment lasted until a happy family chucked a bunch of fireworks and matches in our hands and made the more courageous among us go face-to-face with the explosives... which in turn lasted only a few minutes, cut short by a racing scooter that hit our lovely Basque and took a bite out of his shin. Hence we started a frantic midnight rickshaw-race, making reconnaissance with the indoors of two hospitals. The intelligence concluded that direct hit fireworks' victims were too abundant to accommodate someone with a petty scratch like that.

Each time I buy a bottle of water, I twitch with guilt

I cannot look away any more, letting them pack all my goods in unnecessary plastic bags. A strip of a thin pink or blue plastic bag hanging out of the corner of the mouth of a homeless holy street cow is quite a disgusting sight. I have seen it far too many times. It really is easy to insist that the cashier take the bag back even if I have to do an extra hand movement and lift my bananas out of it. Somehow, at home, it eventually seemed easier not to bother any more and accept the ten bags on an average market day: one to wrap a few oranges, another for a bunch on bananas, then one for bread and yet another for cucumber. It looks so stupid now.

Even if there are no plastic-eating cows in Europe and the rubbish is neatly hidden away from my sight, it doesn't mean it's really gone. Landfills are as effective as brushing the dirt under the carpet in the living room. Recycling still uses up natural resources and in turn creates its own pollution. India, being an incomparably poor country, simply does not have the money nor educational or infrastructural systems to deal with it yet.


Visiting India is a perfect crash-course on environmental issues for a Westerner like me. I know that at home I inevitably produce ten times more garbage than I would ever do in India, where I mostly consume only to cover my basic needs. Even then, the locals undoubtedly produce even less rubbish than me.


It is always a problem how to dispose of the daily plastic remains of my drinking water. The scraps of newspaper used for wrapping food is less of a problem to throw on a pile of crap on the street. Also, it took me only nearly two months to learn to drop fruit peel directly on the ground as opposed to carrying it around in search of a hungry goat.


Bins are rare and I know that probably even the ones I find will be emptied into nature. Or in better cases, burned right there on the street, adding to the thick blanket of smog that covers the lowlands from Delhi to the base of the Himalayas. I got all too familiar with the smell of burning plastic. It was very clear how every action of a single individual adds up to the allconsuming pollution. Why the Himalayan glaciers melt and how on earth that heat-absorbing soot gets on top of them is not a mystery any more. I try not to think about the carbon emissions of all the flights I take. Education has a cost - this is how I excuse it for myself.

The usual - transdimensional logistical scheming

Going somewhere always starts with a story of getting there. Often it is an adventure in itself. If Frodo had taken the straight flight to Mordor and ridden a cable-car up to the Mount Doom, the story would have been over in two pages. Comfort and excitement are not friends.


My personal quest of getting to India started a long way back with all kinds of last-minute logistical problems such as not having any money; then having money but no visa; then having barely enough time to get a visa (and considering all the considerable neighbouring countries with an Indian Embassy); then telling all my friends that I'll leave Montpellier tomorrow but failing to leave until the day after with the first flight to Brussels (because barely enough time means impossible in French, compared to probable in Dutch); then battling a bad flu all week and a half while waiting for my visa... which I got in the afternoon before the morning that my flight took off from Frankfurt to where I had to hitchhike first, having only 3 hours of daylight left. Inevitably, as a bonus track, the visa application center included the mandatory 15-minute scene of mobilizing their whole crew to go about jittering, looking for my lost passport even though everyone else seemed to get theirs back swiftly enough. Mr.Murphy has always had a special spot for me in his heart.


So there I was in summer clothes, shivering in the freezing wind on the German border at sunset, still about 300km away from the airport. To deceive my body into not dieing of exposure and to keep the spirits up I let out a continuous stream of improvised heart-warming songs in the lines of Pleeeeease, take me to wooonderful waaaarm and sunny Indiaaaaaaa, ooooo, Indiaaaaaaa! I felt like an opera superstar, shouting the lines at the top of my magnificent voice. I doubt that anybody could hear me across the roaring of the cars on the autobahn. Lucky them.


As always, shortly after my thumb went numb with cold and anxiety started sneaking in, I started finding awesome rides. First a nice gentleman handed me a map of Germany. From that moment on I could stop relying on the extremely sketchy map existing only in my head. Next I had a good laugh with two young fellows from Köln who pampered me as best they could and made a long detour for my benefit. Without even knowing how incredibly hungry I was, they forced me to accept a bagful of food, including sandwiches made by grandma the same morning. And lastly, they drove me to a petrol station and talked me into the car of a chatty heart surgeon who had worked as a volunteer doctor in McLeod Ganj - just where I was heading. I took it as a sign and vowed to follow it.


Et alors, after all this everything suddenly seemed ridiculously easy from the moment I stepped out of the Delhi airport, carrying precisely 7.3kg of luggage. A familiar mischevious grin erupted on my face and I was ready toEt alors, after all this everything suddenly seemed ridiculously easy from the moment I stepped out of the Delhi airport, carrying precisely 7.3kg of luggage. A familiar mischevious grin erupted on my face and I was ready to start my 2-months' survival experiment in this new, unknown corner of the world. I called it my very first real holiday.

But still I hadn't decided the direction to take out of Delhi - Varanasi? Rishikesh? Amritsar? - as late as when sitting in the New Delhi train station ticket office, flapping a half-filled foreigner's form in my hand where only the destination gap was unfilled. All my very first day in India I had a curious tendency to befriend old Western women. There I got hints from a nice Czech Parisian and surprise-surprise, found myself on an upper berth of the overnight train to Pathankot the same evening with Dharamshala-McLeod Ganj due the next day.