Maya Swell Press

Train from Bordeaux pulls into Paris late afternoon on a Friday, montparnasse station a grey ugly concrete shell. I’m a bit on guard … I’ve heard stories about Paris, edgy dangerous and full of thieves. Cautious, I double check the station map before I get off the platform. A young African guy just off the […]

Further back in the journey, someone had pointed out that you couldn’t really have experienced everything that Indian trains had to offer unless you had at least one trip in general class. The sleeper class that I had used up till now had reserved seats, and allocated bunk beds. General is chaotic, allocated only in […]

Used to be that GOA stood for Good On Acid. Now it seems like it’s back to simply “good on a humid sunny day by the beach”. Not quite the party zone that it once was. Government regulations, a few very dried up conservatives, and a music and alcohol curfew. There is still a bit […]

Hampi (as in ‘humpy’) is another of those pieces of India that are somehow in a bubble of time. Like nothing has changed there for a 1000 years, maybe an empire or two rise and fall, and leave their assorted bits and pieces lying around … The scenery is lush piled on desolation. Granite pebbles […]

Back in Bangalore for the second stint of lessons in Hindustani raga, and Saturday turns out to be one horrendous bad hair day. An afternoon of getting increasingly pent up, and I think the only way of straightening my head out is a decent night of dance … it’s about time to explore the rich […]

Late march, around the 23rd, arrived at Gokarna. The dream of a relaxed sit by a beach with a sunset over the ocean was coming closer. It was a near thing … made the morning train from Mangalore with plenty of time to spare, and then fluffed around watching the world go by … watching […]