Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
2
'Meditate More and Find Out'
BANGALORE, 1974
How can the mind take hold of such a country? Generations of invaders
have tried, but they remain in exile.
- E. M. Forster,
A Passage to India
Captain Singh piloted his Indian Airlines jet through air that felt
and looked like steaming broth with big lumps in it. Bombay from
a few thousand feet above looked overwhelmingly verdant - at least
it did when you could see anything of it. The predominant colour
of the city from street level, however, struck me as faded ochre.
Green it was not. Captain Singh continued speaking to his
passengers with an aeronautical bedside manner, giving much
information on wind speeds, height and local geography below the
clouds, while his plane felt as if giants were playing catch with it.
Whenever we hit an especially savage air pocket, we plummeted
about three hundred feet, landing on what felt like boulders but
were presumably clouds. During one of these abrupt descents, the
man next to me threw an entire cup of orange juice over his pristine
white pyjamas, as if intentionally.
'There is some turbulence,' he said, laughing inanely, and wiped
at the dripping yellow stains with a piece of tissue the size of a
postage stamp.
A man seated in front with what looked like a tuning fork sketched
in white paint on his forehead turned to peer between the headrests
at us.
'Turbulence, turbulence,' he stated, in case we hadn't noticed.
Some rows down, an overhead locker had spilled its contents
onto the passengers below. Uncomplaining, people were handing
briefcases, a bag of mangoes, some shawls and a tattered cardboard
box elaborately swathed in string back to a flight attendant wearing
a sari of such opulence she could have been the subject of a wedding.
'Bombay mangoes,' the man beside me said as the attendant tried
