My cook's granddaughter started menstruating yesterday. Big loan from us for the festivities. She gets a ring and a silk sari for her pains.
At dusk small bats swoop through the garden. One divides our conversation with a swift brown blur.
Driving home under a discarded lemon-rind moon, a yellowed fingernail-paring moon.
I love the sound of the Urdu word 'chilman' -- a split bamboo or reed curtain; and its half-concealing, half-revealing qualities. It’s a one-word poem.
In Mahabalipuram: A sea-turtle dead on the sand. It must have been caught in a fishing net. Crows crowd it, pecking.
A friend who came with us to Mahabalipuram showed me a rubber wedge, brought to keep the door from blowing shut. "They say you should always pack a wedge."
From Hindi film Jab We Met: "No no, it's not what you think: we are just by-the-way friends."
A typical-looking Indian godman interviewed on TV - long hair, flowing robes - said in an American accent: "This is not a fashion statement."
Movie review: ''Sharath Kumar's new film is a reincarnation and revenge drama.” Ho hum. How many r&r dramas can there be?
At Amethyst, I bought magenta orchids and a bouquet of long-stemmed pineapples, each fruit 2 1/2 inches long. Slender spiny leaves - ouch.
There's a big snake in the garden, watchman says. Not a cobra. Poor creatures, where can they go, with construction everywhere.
A giant ant bit the side of my toe like the sliding in of a splinter of glass.
Our three coconut trees are being poulticed with neem powder, turmeric, camphor and salt. The coconut-man shinnies 30 feet up to the crown on a circle of rope.
Cleaning out a cupboard, I found a stack of old 25-paise postcards and gave them to my maid, who said, "But everyone talks on the cellphone nowadays."
Man on the Street on the TV news: "This area has been called Prabhadevi [Hindu goddess] since the time of Baba Adam [Muslim/Christian first man]."