The big problem of traveling in India is that if you don’t have your camera on at all times, you miss 99% of the available amazing photographs.

So many strange, wild, weird and wonderful things are happening all the time… (You see holy men who look like they’ve been walking the roads of India for a 1,000 years, women in beautiful saris walking at a steady pace while perfectly balancing all sorts of things on their heads).

The other day, we drove our tuk tuk (slowly and carefully) through a herd of about 30 long-horn bulls walking towards us down the middle of the road in a village.

We recently passed an incredibly picturesque little village in which each home was a perfect little adobe hut with thatched roofs and a shaded front porch. In front of one these huts, a little boy had propped the back wheel of his antique bicycle off the ground on two bricks and was happily peddling away on his exercise bike – who needs expensive gym memberships.

When you turn your camera off, out of nowhere something amazing happens. You scramble frantically to grab your camera. That was it! That was the photo best photo opp I’ve seen all week!

By the time you get your camera turned on and ready, it’s over. Gone. Suddenly, there is nothing again. India blinks at you with a blank expression, like a blank screen.

Then you put your camera away and it starts all over again (amazing thing, get camera, amazing thing ends, turn camera off, repeat).

India is very sneaky.

On the evening of Day 6, we arrived in a small (but uber busy) city called Dahr and I decided to beat India at her own game. Eric went for a walk, so I sat on a ledge outside our hotel, turned on my video camera and just held it trained on the action in the center of town.

By normal standards, there were lots of strange, bizarre and glorious things happening on the streets, but by India’s high standards it was a very average, normal evening.

So I turned my video camera off and decided to just watch the chaotic scenes.

A few moments later, Eric flew past at high speed riding on the back of an Indian man’s scooter.

I thought to myself, I’ve seen some weird stuff in India, but that was strange. Where the heck was he going? And who was he with? We only just got here. He doesn’t know anyone in Dahr. That is freakin’ weird.

Then I realized… Damn it! It was the weirdest thing I’ve seen all day and I missed it! I had literally just put my video camera down.

A little bit later in the evening, Eric and I went to dinner at a restaurant just outside of town.

We’ve eaten so much naan that our fingers are becoming doughy. I have visions of big scary blobs of naan hovering over me in my dreams. So, in Dahr, we agreed… no naan with dinner.

When we finished ordering our shahi paneer, aloo palak, yellow dahl and pilau rice, the very friendly waiter asked… “Chapati?”

“What?”

“One?”

“No. Sorry. What is chapati?”

“Like naan. Two chapati?”

“Oh. No. No thank you.”

He blinked (confused and a little bit afraid to return to the kitchen without chapati in our order).

“Maybe just one chapati?”

“No. Really. Thank you. No.”

He stood there for awhile not quite sure how to process this information and then, resigned and defeated, he went to submit our order.

A few moments later, the manager of the restaurant came to our table. “Is everything OK with the restaurant, sir?”

“Yes. Of course. It’s great.”

“Would you like to try some chapati maybe?”

“No. No thank you. We’ve had a little too much bread lately. Just some pilau rice would be great.”

He smiled graciously. He understood. “Of course. No problem.”

Ten minutes later, our food arrived: a delicious yellow dahl, aloo palak, shahi paneer, pilau rice and… chapati.

What can you do? They wanted us to have chapati. Clearly, we were always going to have it at the table. It wasn’t really a question. They were just being incredibly polite and gracious. We didn’t eat it, though.

We sat and happily recounted the day’s events and ate our food with fork and spoon.

A few minutes later, the manager appeared again.

“Would you like me to show you how to eat?”

Um. Yeah… We’ve made it this far in life. We kinda thought we had the whole eating thing down, but OK.

“Sure.”

He deftly tore off a small piece of chapati, held it between his thumb and two peace fingers and scooped up a nice mouthful of dahl.

Then we realized our fatal error. We had disturbed the balance and harmony in the universe (but, more importantly, the balance and harmony in the restaurant).

Imagine going to an upscale restaurant in Paris and the waiter asks, “Would you like some silverware with your meal?”

“No. No thank you.”

“A fork?”

“No. Really. Thank you. We’ve had a lot of forks lately.”

“Perhaps a spoon, sir…?”

“No thank you. No fork. No spoon. Just some chapati.”

 

(I did manage to catch a few minutes of video of a religious celebration / street party that came to life as I walking around Dahr at night, so that’s at least something…)