My Recent Adventure

This time when I travelled, I decided to pen down my thoughts on a little notepad that I picked up from Hotel La Ville at Den Haag (The Hague), Netherlands my first destination. On reading it now, I realise most of my observations are pure entertainment and I think it might be worth me jotting them online as I am bound to lose this little notepad of mine. What brought me to Hague was a performance with ATMA dance; a company class and to be a member of the jury for the India Dance Battle organised by Korzo theatre the night before the performance. Being a part of the Jury was an experience! I sat with Renus, a famous tv dance judge/personality on Dutch television and Revanta Sarabhai (son of Mallika Sarabhai) and this is what I wrote about it in my notes
1/10/11 – “Its so ironical how recently in my last blog entry online, I spoke about finding the best in what you see, While judging the dance battle at Korzo, really challenged this view. How do you look for the best in pieces that have nothing to offer? Is it just dance that makes me so cynical? But even though I thought cynical, I spoke positive and I will never forget that worst Kuchipudi performance I’ve ever seen and had to speak about”
Our performance the next day went well with a lot of positive feedback. I think I went back to the Hotel and crashed so no notes! The next I’ve written is on the 3rd, the day I had the epic breakfast with Pauline! Oh my God! Can the two of us eat? That is an understatement! I also left for Amsterdam right after, so on my way this is what I scribbled.

3/10/11 – “Sitting on the double decked train to Amsterdam now, obviously I had to go sit right on top, no matter how heavy my luggage is. I love these trains, the last time I sat on one was in Paris. Hague was absolutely gorgeous. The weather was perfect. The women and men are so tall and fit it’s amazing. This morning I had the best breakfast ever. I had three soft, warm, crispy croissants; the most I’ve had in one go (Dutch bakers = sensational); freshly cut juicy fruits with thick creamy yogurt and crunchy granola and nice hot green tea to flush it down my system. I also remember having some chocolate butter and crispy bread. Don’t ask me the order it’s all in my stomach somewhere. This is called holiday binging. I woke up this morning feeling quite low and tired but I think the breakfast and the trains have really energised me now and I’m getting excited about getting into Amsterdam soon.”

On 3rd evening I met Beatriz, a friend’s friend, Spanish and living in Amsterdam and ate Thai food for dinner. Talk about global. Beatriz and I hit it off instantly, she’s as indecisive as me and she doesn’t plan anymore either. What was similar in our lives is that we put in or at least tried to put in a lot of energy into our plans, but plans always ditched us and hence we were forced to leave things to time. Our lives tend to have a greater control over us than we do. And that’s our story. I also met two beautiful Californian girls who I shared a room with, in a hostel in Amsterdam. They usually seemed quite blissfully unaware of their surroundings and spoke about their other friends like a story straight out of an American teen high school movie. My! Were they scandalised by the red light district or what? I heard no end of it, but it was really fun hanging out with them. They were quite happy go lucky which is always great.

4/10/11 – “OMG, I can’t believe I spent two fabulous days in Amsterdam, I have to write all about it, although I don’t know If I’ll be able to do it justice. I’ll start with the carnival I happen to see by chance as I made my exit from the Van Gogh Museum, which was amazing too, but yes the carnival was juicier! I was so delighted to see how comfortable all the gay, transsexuals, drags were in their skin. They gave me such incredible eye contact that it made me think whether I was alien? Their territory was evident. The costumes were so creative and colourful, the drummers were dramatic, themes were daring, dancers were happy and confident. I just had such a great time!”
It’s interesting to see how the residents of Amsterdam take so much pride in their city while the tourists are just the exact opposite. They seem to have no respect for the city and throw garbage and puke everywhere. Most of the tourists seem to be young boys and girls trying to get laid or smoke up legally at a coffee shop. So discovering Amsterdam is out of their agenda.
I absolutely loved it though, it was so easy to make friends in that city and also the fact it’s so liberal. I went to a souvenir shop to try dutch chocolate (you know like Belgian chocolates) and he offered me a cannabis lolly! I also saw ‘Want sex? Just Smile’ key chains and ‘Why drink and drive when you can smoke and fly’ tshirts! I loved the canals and the tilted houses. The cyclists are manic but it’s a much greener option than cars.

4/10/11 (late night) – “My definition of Amsterdam – think water water everywhere but not the kind you would drink. Now replace water with sex and drugs. You get the idea. Anyway my flights about to land in Madrid, can’t wait to get there!”


In Madrid I stayed with my gorgeous friend Mudra, who lived quite centrally so everything was walking distance. I walked it to Museo Centro de Arte Reina Sofia, that museum is just beautiful. Along with the architecture of the new and the old buildings, the earlier works of Picasso were just fascinating. If you ever get there, go on the terrace of the new building. The atmosphere is a juxtaposition of the bustling city and absolute peace; I actually didn’t want to leave! I would go back to Madrid just for that museum.

5/10/11 – “Right now, sitting literally on the street in a cafe outside Reina Sofia, eating patatas bravas (potatoes in tomato sauce) for lunch, the only vegetarian option in the menu. Why does everybody in Europe only eat bread, meat and cheese?”
“People assume I’m Spanish, so they refuse to talk to me in any other language. Even after I ask them ‘hablas englis?’ i.e. do you speak English? One of them even said ‘Si’ i.e. yes and continued to talk to me in Spanish! Maybe she thought I was testing her or maybe she thought I’m a snobbish Spaniard who likes to talk in English in her own country! Whatever next time I’m going to try and change my appearance in some way so I look like a tourist or maybe I’ll just learn some Spanish before I go!”
At the cafe before I ordered my famous patatas I had another language tug-a-war with the waiter. ‘No Español?’ asked the waiter and started speaking in fluent French to which I was again gob smacked. ‘No Français?’ ‘No’ I said with a really dull face. ‘No Englis either?’ he said to which I snapped ‘Si Englis si englis si englis!’ and he called one of the younger waiters who knew English to converse with me.
I realised that day I didn’t want to be a tourist. I felt us tourists are so superficial. We go to different countries and touch the surface by sightseeing, museum hopping, eating at restaurants and leaving, but what do we learn? Nothing we haven’t read in guide books already. I want to learn the language and live like the locals do, experience it from inside, even if it’s only for a week. That’s my resolution for my next travel.

I think after the previous entry I became slightly lazy about writing in my little notepad, so for the remaining part of the holiday I’m going to continue writing out of memory. So what is it that I remember the most about Madrid? Oh yeah, they can party, and I mean all day all night party. There are some really arty funky areas in Madrid with streets made of stone, that was aesthetically pleasing. I also loved this sweet shop I ate Spanish sweets from in Sol. I bought Spanish trousers with a ‘made in India’ label, seems like they’re outsourcing as well. I saw Palacio Real, Almudena cathedral and shopped at Gran Via. I loved walking and the last few times I made my way back to Mudra’s place without a map, which was great considering the number of times I got lost, which also is fun. This actually reminds me of an interesting article I read in travel magazine. It read –

Anyone who is constantly travelling is always somewhere else and therefore always absent. There is however one place where you are constantly, all the time, namely yourself. And no matter how simple that sounds it does take a long time before you become fully aware of this.
Excerpt from Nomads Hotel – travels in time and space by Cees Nooteboom.