My 12 Steps

I am becoming obsessed with traffic, street traffic, the ordinary everyday traffic in this part of the world, with the desire of penetrating the logic of absurdity, the realization of the impossible, the fluidity of stagnation.

In my two days in Hong Kong I experienced the precise organization of the subways system, the impressive view from The Peak and the aring tram ride to it, the child-like joy of observing the city and the traffic from the second floor of a two decks roofless bus, the relaxing short ride on the ferry to the mainland. And the traffic.

In retrospect, I believe that Hong Kong is the preparing ground to the shock that is to come when one moves to Thailand. It helps a westerner to get acquainted with a traffic going the "wrong" way, but the little pangs of fears arising from the impression that the driver is drunk, are smoothened up by a sense of regularity and organization.

During the couple of weeks in Thailand I enjoyed the sweet kindness and the smiling ambiguity of the people, the disorganized charm of a huge weekend open market, the practicality of the sky-train, the complexity and simplicity of street vendors' food in Bangkok, the serenity of Koh Samed and its tranquil and clean ocean water, the romantic sunsets amidst the intense green of the varied foliage, the relaxed rage of the sudden and instinctual rain, the mellowing of the humid heat in contrast with the refreshing air-conditioned spaces, but at the moment all I can think of is the traffic in Bangkok.

Then it came Bangladesh. Everytime I mentioned to friends and acquaintances that I would go to Bangladesh I was asked the same question: Why? The only answer acceptable to the different degrees of disbelief accompanying that question was that I wanted to visit with my dear friends Sophia and her son Sohel. I believed that the joy of friendship would be the only excitement ot this trip. I stand corrected. Here I came into contact whith a much deeper meaning of the word hospitality and with a more profound understanding of the concept of social contracdictions and institutionalized poverty. Here I also discovered the existence of such different landscapes within the uniformity of the land, the charming beauty of century old tea gardens, the inescapable ugliness of unplanned urban growth. Here I kept exploring the intricacies of different social customs, religious behaviors, bureaucratic corruption. But what it struck me most here is what I believed to be the most chaotic, insane, surreal traffic. Till I went to Delhi.

My eleven days excursion to the northern part of India has been a fantastic experience.