Indian Samurai इंडियन सामुराई

… You decide to go alone to the furniture neighbourhood and…

… You get dropped at the metro station on a bike by a colleague. It is 6 PM. The metro is quite packed but you are in the woman coach. Changing metros is another story. What happends when dozens of people want to get down and a jerk between the 2 doors refuses to move?? Well you fly, carried away by the others. A concert of hardrock is donkey pee next to that.

You arrive one hour later at Kirti Nagar. You take your cycle-rickshaw (with the guy who cycles). You visits several stores and ended up selecting a bed. Of course you can not get it now, you have to have it made: you don’t have an Indian mattress – broad enough for 6 people to sleep in (a family – and this is no joke).
It is 7:45 PM. Oh God but what is this city?? Everything is shutting down! In Mumbai you can shop easily till 9:30!! Things become less funny. There is no rickshaw. This is a blood industrial area. There are only guys. And trucks. It is pitch dark (except for campfires). You mistake “subway” with “metro” and cross the industrial area back and forth.

You end up finding the metro. You travel back. You get back to the surface.
You are overtired (you have been walking for 4 hours). You are super cold (It is 5 degrees).
A rickshaw stops, this good soul…
And what do you do?? You bargain!! No, not 30 rupees, 20 rupees. And you go one for 15 euro cents. Some will assert that this is a question of principle. But in these circumstances, you hate yourself!! It is ridiculous…

To finish I got it for 25 rupees. But after travelling the very short distance I gave him 20 rupees and left…

The day before the festival of Shiva (on February 20), I came across one of his devotees with his trident (!!) while waiting for my rickshaw:

In the evening, during dinner, I asked my hosts: “What is Maha Shivatri?”.
Answer of the father: “no idea”.
Answer of the mother (who thought hard): “Once upon a time there was Vishnu who spent much of his time lying down on his snake itself lying on the ocean. One day the ocean was irritated and started to throw up things. The demons and the gods shared them but nobody wanted the poison. Then Shiva sacrificed himself and swallowed the poison. But his wife, refusing him to die, put her hands around his neck so that the poison would not go down. But the gods, refusing the poison to be spelled out, blocked his mouth. Thus the poison remained in Shiva’s head and that it is why he is blue. This is what we celebrate for Maha Shivaratri.”

Apparently it is the right explanation (at least one of the right explanations)!     http://hinduism.about.com/od/festivalsholidays/p/mahashivratri.htm