India

Exactly 2 years ago this month the Esquire and I huddled together in a tent in the middle of the Thar desert in Rajasthan, making whispered plans about our future family and plotting the day we would come back to India with our children. We had spent the previous few months wandering around northern India and even though we were initially, completely overwhelmed by India's....well... India-NESS, we had slowly fallen in love with the country.

Everything you have heard about India is true. It is dirty, joyful, poor, religious, ambitious, devout, crowded, constantly moving and changing, full of history, colorful, exotic, and undeniably beautiful. But to truly see what India is like, you have to take those words and magnify them by 1000 and even then India will still be more than you can imagine. Like it's cuisine, India itself is complex and layered, traditional and changes with every bite.

To say it plainly: I love India. I love India and I can't wait to see its wonders through our children's eyes. I love India and I am utterly heartbroken by last weeks events in Mumbai.

Heartbroken. Heartsick.

As I read about the attacks, my heart simultaneously races and freezes up. It is similar to how I felt watching the Twin Towers fall on television. Dismay. Disbelief. Distress. Watching so many people -a whole country- hurt by just a few people trying to force their beliefs on the world. How does this happen? Why does it keep happening?

I am not naive. I know India isn't all twinkly bracelets and yoga retreats. I know it's long history, much of which has been violent, both to outsiders and to their own. But no country deserves this.

I'm rambling. Sorry. I just don't know what else to do with this sadness. And I suppose this is the purpose of a blog ... an outlet for rambles.