Roaming in India
“Is there somewhere I can be alone ?”, I asked bluntly a the reception desk of a popular backpacker hostel in Jaipur. “Yes, we have this private room on the third floor but no one wants it,” the young man replied. “Who wants to live alone?”
It wasn’t a great room. It had a window covered with deceptively cheerful curtains in a bright blue pattern, their sole purpose being to mask the narrow gap between the building I was in from the one next to it; the white bedsheets had a yellow stain; the white walls were sullied with smudges of grease and what seemed like coffee splashes. It would have to do.
Most people don’t come to India for comfort, not the material kind anyway. The country has one of the world’s most successful space programmes, yet in a society steeped in cultural traditions and ancient rituals most westerners are lured by the spiritual nourishment — to remind themselves how the world used to be, perhaps gain an insight on where it’s headed. India has also been a magnet for nonconformists, mavericks even — Steve Jobs travelled there in 1974, before returning to the States to found Apple. During my travels around the north of the country I met a Brazilian woman who left a profitable career at a multinational to study Yoga; a guy from Montenegro who dropped out of law school to become a basketball coach in China; and a music producer from Norway who worshipped Michael Jackson…
