Shopping in Dharamsala

I had a dream in which I was in Dharamsala and it was something like a historical documentary of Dharamsala at the same time. According to this dream, the British took over it in the nineteenth century. Later India took it back and then the British took it from them again. And there may have been some military types in this dream.

Earlier, I had a dream involving the Dalai Lama and Dharamsala, but now it escapes me. I also vaguely recall that I had a weird and disturbing dream involving monsters of some sort.
I’m getting an image of a field and vehicles—in association with probably the last dream. I mentioned I’m afraid that’s the best I can come up with. I was hoping that if I kept writing on these dreams that they’d come back to me, but it doesn’t seem to be working. Maybe the one that I described as being about monsters was really about the Chinese picking on Tibetans—that seems likely. Or maybe it was about my personal monsters.

After we ate dinner last night, Shantum made his announcement and said we would have a forty minute talk with the Tibetan prime minister of the government in exile, so we should think of some questions to ask him. Questions I could ask the prime minister:

Do you agree with the Dalai Lama’s intention of not making Tibet completely independent, but rather keeping the connection with China for the sake of the economy and military defense?

How do you picture Tibet fifty years from now?

At breakfast this morning, I sat at a long table, as did Rachel and Jamie. Rachel said it was a rather odd table, as if we were part of a panel discussion. It also added, I thought, to the lack of coziness in the big, cold dining room. We should have been huddled around a smaller table, sitting close together, instead of three people spread far apart and facing the same direction. Other people sat at other tables, but I was feeling shy toward them, which is my normal state. I had the delicious masala omelet for breakfast; it includes several vegetables, including hot chili peppers. As I was sipping masala chai, the Rani arrived wearing a salwar-kamiz and with the brown and white puppy on a leash. Of course I oohed and aahhed and petted the puppy and took a couple of pictures of it. The puppy wagged its tail at me.

Early in the morning, probably before seven, Sheila and a few other people and I stood in front of Cloud’s End and waited for the taxis to arrive. Three taxi cabs were parked several yards below us, at a turn in the narrow road that ends in front of the guesthouse, but the taxis all suddenly drove off at the same time. “I wonder why they’re leaving,” Sheila said.

I said, “Maybe they’re spies. They’re Chinese terrorists! Ahhh!” in a comical and melodramatic manner. Since seeing the Dalai Lama, I was still feeling euphoric.
“Ah, Susan must be a morning person,” Sheila said. “You’re up and making jokes at this hour.” That's funny--I've never thought of myself as a morning person.

Enid, Mimi, and I went shopping in the heart of Dharamsala. I did not yet know my way around and simply followed along. Mimi led us to a store that sold semi-precious stones in countless sizes and colors, and she explained that she was looking for a stone to carve. I found that fascinating and impressive and certainly a kind of project that I can’t see myself even attempting. I mentioned that I sculpt, mostly with polymer clay, but I rather suspect that carving something out of a hard surface is infinitely more difficult than sculpting with soft clay.

We entered a second shop that sold stones, but it was mostly full of shawls, which rather distracted me. The Kashmiri shopkeeper was very friendly and chatty and told us that he has pashmina shawls. He showed us a picture of a shaggy black and white sheep that he explained is the one source of pashmina, the softest wool in the world. He had a tall mirror off to the right side of the shop, and Mimi and the shopkeeper draped shawls on me, a beige shawl and a brown shawl and finally a bright orange shawl that seemed to transform my appearance for the better. Who would have thought orange could be such a flattering color? I bought the orange pashmina shawl despite the high price, and I also got a dark red cotton shawl embroidered with orange loopy designs.

The friendly Kashmiri shop keeper encouraged us (Mimi, Enid, and me) to visit Kashmir because it’s “the most beautiful place in the world.” Not of course that he was biased. It does indeed sound beautiful, with the mountains and houseboats with hanging gardens, but Enid was particularly dubious about whether it would be safe, what with the terrorist activity for which it’s famous. But the shop keeper said it’s been safe. Still, Enid pointed out that “people hate Americans.” In my world travels since 2004, I’ve often felt embarrassed to admit to being an American, even in London. I am sometimes tempted to claim that I’m from Toronto, Canada, but I have this thing about honesty. Anyway, we had a nice talk with the Kashmiri shopkeeper, and he even invited us to tea, but we were dubious because of our busy schedule, and as Mimi pointed out, typically Shantum didn’t tell us what we’d be doing until one day in advance.
Mimi or Enid or someone said this, and later it came up in conversation that sure we get the details in advance on flights, train rides, and guesthouses, but it’s really Bina who handles all that. Shantum isn’t exactly the greatest at organization, at least in the sense of letting us know things in advance. Maybe it’s more like he isn’t big on communicating such things, just as he often isn’t good about checking his e-mails.

After we left that shop and wandered down the narrow, busy street, past many stands and shops, I paused in front of another Kashmiri shop where hand embroidered items were on display on a table by the front steps; they included bags, elephant tea cozies, and circular hats, all embroidered in bright colors. I tried one of the hats on, but it was too tight for my enormous head, but the shopkeeper saw me and invited me into the store, telling me that there are plenty of hats inside. Mimi and Enid said they’d wait for me outside, so I followed the shopkeeper up the alarmingly tall, narrow bright blue steps into the little shop. We walked down a narrow hallway where beautiful rugs lined the walls, and there were two small rooms with other items on display, including more rugs, tea cozies, and hats like the one I tried on. I found a burgundy hat that fit me, and which I’m wearing. The hat, or more specifically fez, is completely covered with a chain stitch design of birds and flowers. We went to a café and sat at a small table outdoors with our headphones on, but the reception on the radio was lousy.