Solo Trip to India and Nepal

I spent the past week alternating work days and beach days. It's been very pleasant. Maya is very quiet - I am the only guest! The scheduled Lohri (harvest festival) celebration on Tuesday and the live music events on Friday and last night were all cancelled due to lack of interest! 😊

A planned visit by Sheetal's parents has also been cancelled. Sadly, her Dad fell down the stairs yesterday and broke his leg.

The only excitement all week was when the police turned up to question the family about the unexplained death of a singer who performed here in November. She's been linked to a Russian guy who murdered two Russian women earlier this week by slitting their throats! Now in police custody, he has admitted to killing 10 women!

Today, I had booked for Neha and I to do an all-day 'colours of earth' workshop at Mati Earth where I did the cyanotype printing last week. Despite living here for four years, and being an artist herself, Neha didn't know the place existed. She came to Maya at 9.45am so that we could have breakfast before Umesh drove us to Mati.

We talked about the murders. Neha knows the perpetrator and one of the victims. She and Saahil had bern chatting to them a few hours before the incident! Chilling!!

Once at Mati, we met our tutor, Aastha. There were nine of us doing the workshop and Aastha explained how the day would shape up. The aim was to learn how to extract natural pigments from soil and rock, and use them to make watercolour paints with which we would create art.

We spent the morning session extracting the pigments and making the paints. The rocks had to be crushed to a powder first. Then the soils and powdered rocks had to be washed, rinsed, and allowed to settle. We had to separate the clay part from the sand and silt. We then dried the clay and crushed it again. The next step was to make a natural binder with gum arabic, boiling water, honey, and clove oil. We mixed this with the powder and then mulled it to create the paint. It was a fascinating process, and I was amazed at the range of colours we ended up with.

After a delicious vegetarian lunch, we spent the afternoon painting. I'm definitely no artist, but I enjoyed the process. My 'artwork' was more of a doodle which sort of looked like a fabric patchwork. Neha, on the other hand, who is a very talented artist, produced a beautiful painting!

It was lovely to see the variety of art made by the workshop participants.

When the workshop was over, Neha and I walked home. On the way, we stopped to admire a mural which will soon be hidden from public view forever. At Maya, I sat chatting to Sheetal and Ikjot. They were ordering pizza for delivery, so I stayed and had some, too.

During the evening, I got a call from Emily at Blandred Camping. After 2 interviews and rigorous background checks, I appear to have landed a summer job 😊.Read more