Apparently that’s what one does in Guwahati, Assam, in the curiously shaped northeast states of India (i.e. the section of India you probably don’t picture when you think of the shape of the country). Or at least that’s what I did there. But as hard as this will be to believe, it was not listening to an hour of gunfire–exchanged, presumably, between the Indian Army and local insurgents–from my hotel room that encouraged me to leave so quickly. Nor was it the large crowds of angry men I encountered twice as I walked around the city–they didn’t seem to be angry at me, after all, and if I could speak Assamese maybe I would’ve joined the protests. It also wasn’t the fight I saw in the street, or the fact that it was very difficult to find anyone who speaks English OR Hindi, or that there are machine-gun-toting soldiers on every corner, or that it was just a dreary, dark city without the appeal of even the noisiest and smog-choked of the other Indian cities I’ve visited.

Well, I guess all those things helped, as did how damn unfriendly it was. I know, I know, how dare people not be friendly to the wealthy white foreigner! That’s not quite what I mean. Everywhere else I’ve been, I haven’t been upset when some people are less than friendly (or the opposite of friendly). But in all those other places, there were always at least as many people who would smile back or say hello, or would at least communicate with me when I attempted to communicate, but in Guwahati the very few people who would even look my direction wouldn’t smile, say hello, or even nod their head my way. I guess I should appreciate that new kind of anonymity–the kind which arises when no one around you cares one way or the other about your existence–and it was rather nice to go about 48 hours without seeing a single other white Euro-American walking around.

More than all of that, though, it was just that it’s just very tough to be a solo traveler in the northeast states. To reach Mizoram, Nagaland, and most of the other states in the region, you have to have a permit, which can only be issued to groups of travelers. And even in Assam, I discovered it was going to be out of my price range to visit the famous wildlife parks without a preexisting group. I still want to go back so I can visit Shillong, which is supposed to be a relaxed, music-loving city in happily matrilineal Meghalaya.

For now, though, I got out, but not before having one amazing experience: on one of the dirty, cacophanous walkways above the train station platforms in Guwahati, I found four blind musicians sitting on the ground playing some of the most passionate, ornate percussive music I’ve heard in India; when I walked back by two hours later there were three more blind musicians, and this time two of them were singing a kind of bluesy moan over the percussion. No idea if that was Assamese folk music or something entirely different, but I was desperately wishing I had an audio recorder.

I listened for a bit and hopped on a train, on which I met an Indian Army Border Security Forces soldier named Rajiv (who, like me, is 28 and has three sisters, but, you know, has spent his 20s in Kashmir while I’ve been hanging around college campuses), four Bengali kids who were thrilled to talk to me, and a Darjeeling tea expert who is deeply passionate about American literature. And, once again, the trains in India are helping more than anything else to encourage me to appreciate the transit from one place to another rather than just waiting to arrive at my next destination. I doubt I’ll say the same after many South American bus trips, but right now I’m feeling very good about it (though my tail bone is a bit tired of moving so much, particularly after a long, steep ride from Siliguri, West Bengal, to Darjeeling in a jeep meant for 8 and filled with 12 people, which still made it far less cramped than several other jeeps I saw). Still, you should have seen the face on this 105-pound Nepali man when I climbed in the back next to him.

Ok, I’m getting ahead of myself now. Let me back up:

HAMPI (the short version):

When I left Bangalore I landed in traveler-swamped Hampi. The good: some time to relax, at least a little, some amazing landscapes (pics forthcoming), and temples that seem to have grown out of the boulder-strewn hills and terraced farmlands. The bad: I have to admit to being really put off by the tourist culture in India, with full recognition of my inevitable complicity. In my weeks in India I seem to be bouncing back and forth between tourist-strewn sites and places–mostly cities, but also villages, train and bus rides, etc.–in which I see and meet only Indians. A few observations about the traveler cultures I’ve encountered: I’m convinced that there are no Israelis between the ages of 19 and 27 in Tel Aviv. It’s incredible. Fully half, perhaps more, of the foriegn travelers I meet are Israeli. In Hampi, Varkala and Fort Kochi–the most heavily touristed areas I’ve visited–they’re everywhere. In Kodaikanal, some young Israelis have taken over an entire neighboring village, buying or long-term renting houses, and I’ve heard that Goa is the same. Not quite sure what accounts for this influx, besides the obvious (i.e. young Israelis finishing their military service and using their savings to get the hell out of Israel/Palestine), but those whom I’ve met do seem fairly emblematic of two sorts of tourist “types” I’ve seen again and again (and they’ve definitely aquired a not altogether positive reputation amongst many Indians). This is, of course, a rough and inaccurate schematic, but: The first group are basically hippies of a kind, flocking to backpacker havens, taking advantage of the readily available drugs and tourist-focused infrastructure (formal and informal). The second group are quite similiar but have a “spiritual” bent, visiting ashrams and temples, following gurus and swamys, avoiding places like Mumbai, Bangalore and Delhi (since those places aren’t the “real” India), etc. The curious/interesting thing is, as the French woman I was hanging out with in Mysore put it, “Whatever they’re looking for, it’s not Indian.” She didn’t mean that there’s some authentic India that they’re missing, but that the places, clothes, and groups these travelers inhabit don’t often seem to be those inhabited by Indian people, and very few of them seem at all interested in interacting with Indians at all. I don’t know, I’m sure I could come up with some critique that explains how what these travelers are doing is ethical and what I’ve been doing is totally bankrupt, but I’m tired.

And I need to write about MUMBAI and much else.