Marina woke up this morning not feeling well and running a slight fever. She ended up in bed all day sleeping. The rest of us made forays out for a few hours at a time, coming back to check on her in between. We’re now waiting for the doctor and hope that he can give her something to help make her better quickly.
Our first stop this morning was the house where Mahatma Gandhi lived just before he was assassinated. We saw the room where he greeted visitors, and the case containing all of his earthly possessions, which wasn’t a heck of a lot. Gandhi led quite an interesting life full of contradictions, but obviously of very high impact on India.
There were a hilarious set of displays in the upstairs of the house that seemed to be made by museum-designers-gone-wild. Since they had few artifacts of Gandhi’s to show, they basically only had photos and text. So they put together a whole bunch of strange displays that essentially were high-tech ways to access those same photos and text. You can imagine the designers sitting around a room, asking “How can we make these exhibits interactive?” For example, there was one exhibit where you spoke one of a specified set of phrases, and your words caused the screen to display Gandhi’s thoughts on that topic. There was another exhibit where you moved a sliding electronic display along a timeline to reveal what was happening in Gandhi’s life at that time. And so on.
The museum was full of eager young museum guides ready to read the text on the wall to you at a moment’s notice, and to demonstrate the high-tech displays. Our absolute favorite display was a large cylinder standing on the floor. The friendly guide motioned vigorously to us, and instructed us to hold hands. Missy, Joan, Lenny and I grabbed each other’s hands. The guide then told the two on the ends of the line to touch a pad on the floor, at which point a light in the cylinder was illuminated. This exhibit demonstrated the “unity” principle of Gandhi. It was all we could do to keep a straight face. (Okay, I personally did not manage to keep a straight face.)
After the museum, Lenny went back to the hotel to stay with Marina while I accompanied Joan and Missy to a jewelry store that had been recommended to them by their friends. The jewelry was exquisite and reasonably priced. I enjoyed watching Joan and Missy pick out some beautiful items, although passing on them myself.
After a quick lunch at the hotel we headed out on another shopping expedition, this time to a Kashmiri carpet manufacturer. Because Kashmir is difficult to travel to, the rug makers have set up a cooperative in Delhi. We first were treated to a demonstration of how the rugs are knotted by hand in the tradition of the families going back many generations. It seems absolutely amazing to me that these rugs could be made by hand – they are done so tightly it really looks like machine-made.
Lenny and I had been looking for some rugs for our place in Pescadero, but we wanted something a bit more contemporary. The owner seemed a bit surprised by our request for something simpler than the elaborate patterns he had been showing us. He said, “I do have one rug that is more modern in design”; note that this is one rug out of thousands in stock. He brought it out, and we loved it. It was the wrong size, but of course they can custom make any size we want. We were just to the point of deciding whether to get it, and it occurred to me to ask how long it would take. He responded that it would take a year and a half! We hadn’t really figured on waiting that long. He then pointed out that if he made two of them each half the length (it’s a runner), he could do it twice as fast because two people could work at the same time. So we agreed, and ordered the two runners. We felt good about supporting handcraftmanship from small villagers.
We’re back at the hotel now, waiting for the doctor. Lenny and I will skip the planned dance performance we had planned tonight, although we’ll look forward to hearing how it goes from Missy and Joan.
I have unfortunate news for our loyal blog readers: the Palace-on-Wheels train does not have any internet access. We will try to get a wireless phone data card for our notebook, but we’re not sure that we will be able to do so tomorrow. So if you don’t hear from us again for a while, please forgive us!
-- Donna
Our first stop this morning was the house where Mahatma Gandhi lived just before he was assassinated. We saw the room where he greeted visitors, and the case containing all of his earthly possessions, which wasn’t a heck of a lot. Gandhi led quite an interesting life full of contradictions, but obviously of very high impact on India.
There were a hilarious set of displays in the upstairs of the house that seemed to be made by museum-designers-gone-wild. Since they had few artifacts of Gandhi’s to show, they basically only had photos and text. So they put together a whole bunch of strange displays that essentially were high-tech ways to access those same photos and text. You can imagine the designers sitting around a room, asking “How can we make these exhibits interactive?” For example, there was one exhibit where you spoke one of a specified set of phrases, and your words caused the screen to display Gandhi’s thoughts on that topic. There was another exhibit where you moved a sliding electronic display along a timeline to reveal what was happening in Gandhi’s life at that time. And so on.
The museum was full of eager young museum guides ready to read the text on the wall to you at a moment’s notice, and to demonstrate the high-tech displays. Our absolute favorite display was a large cylinder standing on the floor. The friendly guide motioned vigorously to us, and instructed us to hold hands. Missy, Joan, Lenny and I grabbed each other’s hands. The guide then told the two on the ends of the line to touch a pad on the floor, at which point a light in the cylinder was illuminated. This exhibit demonstrated the “unity” principle of Gandhi. It was all we could do to keep a straight face. (Okay, I personally did not manage to keep a straight face.)
After the museum, Lenny went back to the hotel to stay with Marina while I accompanied Joan and Missy to a jewelry store that had been recommended to them by their friends. The jewelry was exquisite and reasonably priced. I enjoyed watching Joan and Missy pick out some beautiful items, although passing on them myself.
After a quick lunch at the hotel we headed out on another shopping expedition, this time to a Kashmiri carpet manufacturer. Because Kashmir is difficult to travel to, the rug makers have set up a cooperative in Delhi. We first were treated to a demonstration of how the rugs are knotted by hand in the tradition of the families going back many generations. It seems absolutely amazing to me that these rugs could be made by hand – they are done so tightly it really looks like machine-made.
Lenny and I had been looking for some rugs for our place in Pescadero, but we wanted something a bit more contemporary. The owner seemed a bit surprised by our request for something simpler than the elaborate patterns he had been showing us. He said, “I do have one rug that is more modern in design”; note that this is one rug out of thousands in stock. He brought it out, and we loved it. It was the wrong size, but of course they can custom make any size we want. We were just to the point of deciding whether to get it, and it occurred to me to ask how long it would take. He responded that it would take a year and a half! We hadn’t really figured on waiting that long. He then pointed out that if he made two of them each half the length (it’s a runner), he could do it twice as fast because two people could work at the same time. So we agreed, and ordered the two runners. We felt good about supporting handcraftmanship from small villagers.We’re back at the hotel now, waiting for the doctor. Lenny and I will skip the planned dance performance we had planned tonight, although we’ll look forward to hearing how it goes from Missy and Joan.
I have unfortunate news for our loyal blog readers: the Palace-on-Wheels train does not have any internet access. We will try to get a wireless phone data card for our notebook, but we’re not sure that we will be able to do so tomorrow. So if you don’t hear from us again for a while, please forgive us!
-- Donna
posted by SawMillLodge at 5:14 AM
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