Gary's Summary

Let's get my heroic 5 AM swandive into a pool of black street sludge in the creepy Delhi train station out of the way first. Ted failed to give the correct version of the truth.

It would have been easy for me to accomplish this feat if it were simply to save a life. I did it to save a seat. Sending Ted & Erin running frantically ahead to scout out the available seats on the morning express to Agra was a good decision. Had I gone first, the two of them would have had difficulty keeping up. I laid back only for security purposes, for I am the patriarchal guide -- it is my duty. Noticing Erin had decided not to follow instructions by setting a pace much too fast and dangerous for her, I did what I had to do. I took the plunge. Fearing injury, I led with my face. I chose a spot which might draw the most attention under the circumstances. The ink-like oozy substance in the puddle made a magnificent splash. The liquid therein had not been displaced since the days of Rudyard Kipling. Upon hearing the inevitable commotion, my loyal daughter-in-law acted exactly as I expected she would. After an obvious, albeit short, internal debate -- forge ahead or give assistance? -- she darted, almost immediately, to my aid. The plan worked.

Now for the truth. Did I take the heroic plunge just to save a seat? No. I did it for medical science. Unknown even to my fellow travelers, it was an opportunity to allow entrance through my open wounds several important substances into my body for their eventual passage from India and through my lower intestinal tract upon my return from the third to the second world. I was able to smuggle with almost no detection several forms of bacteria, viruses, amoeba, and parasites for further study upon my return. After three intense days in my home lavatory, my studies are complete.

Highlights of my dreamlike stay in India: The Plunge, The Communal Haircut in Mandawa, The Taj Mahal, The Taj McMall, and Old Delhi.

Further and more accurate details of The Plunge will be added as imagination matures and memory fades.

For those interested, and for family members, photos of The Communal Haircut will be available upon request. (Family members of course need not request, for they will be provided ad nauseum at holidays, weddings, and funeral parties.)

The Taj Mahal was every bit as magnificent as Ted described. I cannot improve on his account. The memory burned in, though, will forever be the ride there and back and the Star Wars Bar Scene outside its gates. The structure itself is breathtaking.

I'll hold on my summary of the Taj McMall, a catchall term for several of our shopping excursions, until Ted & Erin & I get our stories straight. Again, these will be provided at the aforementioned family gatherings. (As a study guide, see Apocryphal.)

For me, my lasting memory of this incredible country will be Old Delhi. One man told us the population in India will double in the next two or three generations, overtaking China in numbers. Where will they fit? Congestion is not the word to describe what we saw. We need another word. It's like going back to the time of the ancients, adding a few motorized vehicles, sickening-sweet odors of urine & burning cow dung, and all through the city electrical cables thick as your arm draped like dozens of boa constrictors across wooden poles bending from the weight. Walking the streets gives you the feeling of not moving as individuals but as part of a huge almost liquid mass. Eyestrain comes from looking to & fro catching sights challenging your brain & tugging at your heart. Somehow, though, everything works in a way. Everyone is busy doing something. Loitering of the kind seen on the darker streets of Seattle, Denver, or Cincinnati isn't evident. People look bewildered, sad, and sometimes happy all at the same time. But they don't look sinister. We didn't feel threatened. I can't remember witnessing a truly angry exchange in all of India. Gone there are the frequent malicious hand- and arm-gestures we're accustomed to here in large-city traffic. Also absent were signs of traffic accidents. We might've heard one ambulance, and saw very few police. India is at once the most dysfunctional and most functional place I've ever seen. Dysfunction is everywhere. The smell alone is a constant reminder. The numbers of bodies ambling along everywhere staggers the imagination. Raw sewage trickling along with you as you walk, and garbage piled here and there for the sacred cows' personal smorgasbord provides other usable objects for street people to turn into commercial items of some sort at the most primitive level.

I can't wait to return.

I thank Ted & Erin, my wonderful life-long traveling companions, for sharing a small part of their incredible journey, which of course is just beginning. Merry Christmas to all who tune in. If you're Jewish, Happy Chanukka and good luck for another year of deciding which is the correct spelling of your holiday season. If you're Muslim, know that we know not all of you are radical wierdos intent on doing us in, and thank you for the small part of your land I've managed to see and for the small number of fine families I was able to at least greet & smile with while there. If you're Hindu, good luck and may your Bollywood flicks be ever so sappy and wonderful. If you're any other religion, happy holiday or happy unholidays to you, and know that religions that seperate us are not of God. We all must be brought together in spirit, or we cannot survive. We all must travel in whatever way we can -- if not by train, then in mind and heart -- but if by train, count on me. I'll take the plunge & save you a seat.