COLOUR PURPLE AND MOOD INDIGO

Can’t put my finger on it, but I’m experiencing a kind of anticlimactic lethargy. You know –the frittering around at the computer without actually achieving what you set out to achieve. Or actually achieving one thing (like an urgent email) and then fretting because while I was doing that I wasn’t doing something else. Some people procrastinate by playing games. I tend to surf, check my ratings on the online book sites, look at my (currently empty) eBay site and click in and out of the BBC news sites. As if any of these things are likely to change in the space of a morning. Thing is, I’ve finished organising the India jaunt, and I suddenly feel deflated. No excuse for it. Plenty to do, but I just can’t seem to muster up any enthusiasm. Writing? I’m not one of those exponents of ‘you must write something every day’. It’s no good forcing myself. I can only work when the mood grabs me and the mind atoms swim free from their restraining net. If you see what I mean. I don’t think blogging is really a substitute. But it’s beginning to feel like an unavoidable necessity. Not an unpleasant one, I hasten to add. But not exactly productive.

It’s not that I’ve been devoid of activity this week. Quite the contrary. It’s been one event after another. I think I have a problem with being a spectator all the time, without being an initiator. It’s as if you’ve lost your usefulness and are reduced to sitting back and letting life entertain you, contributing nothing. It’s very important to be needed, isn’t it?

Ah well, that’s enough self-indulgence for one day. Back to the great things that have happened this week. Jennifer celebrated her birthday by throwing a big party on Saturday. I somehow found myself glued to a chair in front of the cheese platter. Fatal. I paid for my cheesaholic nibbling though. Two pounds heavier at Slimming World. The two pounds I’d managed to shed the week before. Oh, it’s all so depressing.

But before the party Jennifer decided to disencumber herself of ***’s years of accumulated junk. So she held a garage sale, and somehow I found myself roped in to help. So. Not quite useless yet. Though I’m not quite sure how much use I actually was. The sale was in aid of Age Concern and I’m sure they will, as we were, be absolutely delighted by the proceeds.



Oh – and it isn’t a trick of the light. It was purple hair day for Jennifer – she said she’d do it and she did. It’s show stopping. How liberating it must be to have the courage to make such a statement. Especially when you’re vindicated by such a stunning result.

My Sri-Lankan-Ozzy nephew (in fact, my only nephew) came for lunch on Sunday. A stopover in England between visiting SIS in Monaco and heading back East. Could it really be seven years since we’d last seen him? Seen him in the flesh, that is. I’ve seen him (and his gorgeous little girls) on skype-video-– what a great invention that is.

Our Goldenford meeting on Monday was full of plans for the next few months. You can view our Autumn calendar here. We’re also getting ready for the launch in October of Jay Margrave’s intriguing and clever new Priedeux novel ‘Luther’s Ambassadors’. I shall miss it, of course. Up a tree somewhere in Kerala, no doubt.

I did manage to rouse myself enough today to book some space for a Goldenford book stall at the Guildford Institute in November – lunchtimes in the restaurant on 17th, 18th and 19th November. At the same time, I decided to force myself out of indolence by enquiring about the possibility of holding a study course on Indian Temples at the Institute next year. The upshot – I’m having a meeting with the Institute managers next week. So now I’ve got no excuse for sloth –I‘ve got to get a plan worked out by then.

Talking of Guildford Institute, Tuesday was Guildford Writers’ evening. It was nice to see old writing buddies again after the summer break and to welcome some new members. I didn’t take my ‘work in progress’, since my progress is, as I’ve indicated, akin to that of a constipated tortoise at the moment. I read out part of my Bristol Prize Anthology story instead. Just to give newcomers an idea of the sort of stuff I write. It seemed to go down well.

In fact I think my black mood may be something to do with the weather. After all, we’ve been deprived of any real, lasting exposure to sunlight for a couple of years now. Time to enlist the help of my SAD lamp again. Having said that, I can actually see the sun at the moment. Better go and worship Surya and his seven horses while I can. This picture of Surya was taken at Halebid a couple of years ago - 12th century. See the horses at his feet? Same dynasty as the temple that features in my novel Darshan (never waste an opportunity for a plug, that's my motto!))

Whoops- to late. Fading already…

OUT OF THE TREE HOUSE AND ONTO THE BANDWAGON

I feel somewhat daunted this week, having read Jackie’s last two blogs, both of which I found very interesting. The later one, about the current economic situation (the fall of Lehman etc) left me feeling totally inadequate. I have absolutely no financial skills whatsoever, and I was, in fact, very relieved when I sold nearly all my shares a couple of years back, to build a conservatory. Not that I had many in the first place, you understand, and the only shares I have ever bought in my life are in Goldenford. Well, you’ve got to have shares in your own publisher, after all. The rest were either inherited or imposed on me by building societies who suddenly did clever but totally enigmatic financial mergers and kindly presented me with shares for some incomprehensible reason. Not that I’m complaining. It’s a lovely conservatory. And most of the sold shares were HBOS. I actually sold them on the day that they were at their highest for a couple of years, and the next day they dropped again. Beginner’s luck. Thank goodness I got rid of them!

Anyway, Jackie’s grasp of the situation impresses me greatly and makes me very aware of my own ignorance.

On the subject of sex I’m hopefully slightly less ignorant. However, like Jackie (in her previous blog) I have a problem with writing about (and indeed reading) explicit sex in novels. It’s often gratuitous and it’s a bandwagon. English literature has survived without it for hundreds of years and suddenly it’s indispensable (yes, yes, I know Shakespeare and co weren’t averse to a spot of titillation, but you know as well as I do, that that’s not what I’m talking about). As I said in my comment to Jackie, explicit sex is prostituted sex. There are a few exceptions but generally very few best-selling novels wallow in overt descriptions of what goes on in the bedroom (or the bathroom, or the kitchen floor, or the sheepskin rug, or the hay bale…) To my mind it’s a far greater skill and a thousand times more effective if you can, through your writing, conjure up sensuality without having to spell it out. Or don’t you agree?

Anyway, thanks, Jackie, for two such stimulating blogs. And sorry to have jumped onto your bandwagon!

Back to my own life. This week it took me (and Himself) to London, to drop off our passports at the Indian Visa Office. As I said last week, the office is now outsourced. And what an improvement. We were in there for 5 minutes instead of five hours (as was usual at the High Commission). So plenty of time afterwards to nip onto a bus and head off to the British Library for a look around the exhibition of the Indian epic, Ramayana. At least, that was the idea. In practice though, the exhibition was so superb that it required a day, not the two hours we were able to give it. It was one of the most impressively staged exhibitions I’ve seen for a long time – and I use the word ‘staged’ on purpose, since was apparently organised by a theatrical group. The result was that the exhibits were well set out, incredibly well described and the route around them was very clearly marked.

The exhibits –120 17th century Rajasthani paintings and other artefacts, including books, cloth paintings and so on, were exquisite. The Ramayana story is one of my favourites, mentioned in both my novels, Darshan and The Moon’s Complexion (and here). Having said that, some of the moral conclusions traditionally drawn from the text are a little eyebrow-raising. To my feminist mind. But hardly surprising. Sacred writings seem to be a male preserve. Whatever the religion. So no wonder we women are kept in our place.

Sorry – the exhibition closed on Saturday. But all is not lost. If you look up the webpage here, you can view each painting while you listen to or read the commentary. You can even zoom in on areas you want to study in detail. Technology at its best.

Wasn’t the weather glorious over the weekend? I spent almost all of Sunday gardening. Unheard of! And I actually enjoyed it!

Don’t ever say you can’t get a bargain anymore. How about these gladioli? £2.99 from M & S. Unbelievable. Oh yes, did I mention that the local petrol station has acquired a 24-hour M&S local outlet? I’m doomed.

Have finally got most of the India trip sorted. Had to turn down an ‘eco-resort’ in the mountains of Kerala though. No cottages available. They only had a treehouse left on the date I wanted. Himself, to my horror, said ‘Brilliant, go for it’ and of course he could climb up the bamboo ladder into the tree, in spite of his spinal injury. Even an online review saying the treehouse ‘rocked in the wind’ didn’t put him off. I stalled by emailing the place to ask if it had a bathroom. I had a sleepless night wondering about snakes and storms. The reply to my email came next day. ‘Toilet is there and cold water. Hot water we can bring in buckets.’ Gee, thanks.

Himself eventually capitulated to the voice of reason. Now I’ve got to find him somewhere equally exciting without the Tarzan element. Heyho.

Selective Memories

Is it just me, or does this happen to others? I was sure I’d have a lot to blog about this week. Kept making mental notes must remember to mention that ... ah - meat for my blog…

And here I am sitting down to write the thing and can I remember a single darned event? Okay, okay, so my memory’s always been up the creek, but has it always been up this sh-t creek? Should I be worried?

I’m going back over the last week in my mind. I seem to remember a lot of hassle filling out visa application forms for the Indian Consulate. Guess what – the Indian Consulate has outsourced its visa application centre! (Well, I think it’s funny, anyway). Have to say the new place seemed on the ball when it came to doing all the necessary application stuff on line. I managed to complete the forms, and, of course, submit the payment. I was also able to arrange our interviews online. Which was fine until the confirmation arrived. They had booked us in for 8.45 am. Now how were we supposed to get up to Victoria from Commuterland by that unearthly hour? So in the end we did have to bypass the web and phone up the visa place to speak to a human. Who duly told us to ignore the time (seems all interviews are given the same time) and just turn up when we feel like it!

It’s coming back to me now – I think my week’s been swamped under India things. Including booking tours and hotels. Having to transfer huge sums of money to an unknown Indian travel agency has obviously traumatised me. However, all seems to have worked (shush… shouldn’t tempt fate, still some more booking to do).





So far I’ve arranged a 4-day trip to Ajanta and Ellora – never been there so quite excited about this, a three day visit to Chennai, Kanchipuram and Mahabalipuram (if you’ve read The Moon’s Complexion, these names will ring a bell).

Can’t wait to go back there and see these places through new (post-MA) eyes. I’ve also arranged a 6-day trip through Kerala, backwaters, hillstations, wildlife sanctuary…Cochin (also a major player in The Moon’s Complexion). Here's the interior of the little synagogue in Cochin. Hopefully it will set off another Moon's Complexion bell.


Now I’m juggling with the remaining days, wondering how I can squeeze in my usual pilgrimage to my favourite wonderful place in the whole world – the Keshava Temple at Somnathpur. I fear this patch of heaven will have to do without me this year … and I will leave India bereft. This temple is as much a star player as Sara, Louie and the others in my novel Darshan. Here’s a photo I took earlier…

But it doesn’t do it justice. To quote Satish, one of the minor characters in Darshan, talking about experiencing temples in India: 'Photograph can stimulate the heart, but only experience can stimulate the soul.'

Well, that was a ramble and a half. Now some facts are slowly filtering back into my overstretched mind.

Fact. Lunch with Jackie on Thursday was the usual good gossip – we even sat outside in the sun. The what? Yes, it does still exist, though we haven’t seen much of it lately. I’m in sweaters and socks now. Unheard of for September. No wonder I’m stressed.

Fact. Friday brought a heart-warming surprise. My penultimate German Assistant K from Bayreuth, turned up on the doorstep with her husband R. It was K who managed to procure for us tickets to the Bayreuth Festival in 2005 – one of her many virtues. We saw The Flying Dutchman. Here are the famous trumpeters announcing the start from the balcony of the Festspielhaus.

Here’s a sneak picture I took at the end.


K lived with us for the year she was working with me (1997-8). A real one-in-a-million supergirl. The schoolkids loved her and so did we. I’m not surprised that she decided to become a teacher. A rare, natural talent.

We were thrilled to see her and R again. And an excuse for lunch at the Raj Doot to celebrate.

Fact: On Sunday we made an expedition to North London (Cockfosters) to have lunch with C, our ex-au pair (30 years ago!) turned dipomat, now at an Embassy in London. Not only is she another warm and wonderful person, she’s also an excellent cook. So we sat in her sumptuous flat and dined on tacos and cactus salad. It’s a strange life she lives, a few years in Russia, another few in South America, some more in Africa, and then London. But her furniture, in fact all the contents of her home, are her own, packed up with every new posting and unpacked again in a new country. So her home, really does feel like home.

Time to gear up for the annual carpet cleaning brigade who are about to descend on us. Better grab some lunch before the house is taken over by machines.

BLACKBERRIES, BIRD AND BANGALORE BLUES

What a strange sort of week it’s been. Started off with the sublime and ending with the ridiculous.

The sublime – a happy hour in the garden every day picking blackberries from our bramble patch which I absolutely refuse to turn into some nice, neat flower bed. Blackberries are among the finest wild fruits England has to offer. I remember the excitement of going on day trips into the country to collect them. Now I can get them from my own garden. Heaven.

Mind you, once picked they have to be cleaned. God forbid that a stray maggot should find its way into my breakfast fruit salad, my crumbles or my jams. That would be the kiss of death.

Oh and yesterday we picked our first three bunches of grapes off our vine.

Like Muscatel grapes. Real flavour not like those seedless bags of green water you get in the shops. Ours are delicious. Almost worthy of the unbeatable Bangalore Blues - but not quite – the BBs are in a class of their own. Sadly the Karnataka grape farmers are also now being dragooned into producing the tasteless bags for export (and home produce) so I fear the demise of the BB is not far off.

I’ve finally got the Goldenford brochure into a workable state. Now it’s over to the professionals.

Yesterday Jennifer, Jackie and I attended the opening of the Mole Valley Arts Festival. Goldenford has a slot on 22 October at 7.00 pm in the Green Room of the Leatherhead Theatre so if you’re in the area do come in and hear what they have to say. It will be interesting (it always is!) Ex-TW3 celeb, John Bird, who lives in the area is the official Festival Patron and was in attendance yesterday. He gave up his chair to me. Well actually, he was getting up anyway, to go and make a speech, but it sounds impressive. (His speech was very funny).

Now I’m having nightmares coordinating with a travel firm in India who are doing our trip to Ajanta and Ellora next month. Long distance negotiations! Actually they’ve been very efficient. It’s just transferring the money that’s causing me to tear my hair out. But we’re getting there…

Oh yes – I mentioned the sublime (blackberries) but almost forgot the ridiculous. Which was…On Sunday I had a headache, right? And since I can’t take the usual painkillers, my doctor prescribed something fiendish for me. So I took a couple. Well, it’s always two isn’t it? Wrong. I then decided to look at the dosage. Take one, it said. Too late. Long and short, sick as a … I dunno… sick as whatever gets very sick. Very, very sick. And 3 days on still feeling light-headed.

Ah well – I’m off to pick blackberries now…