Flash Drive Memories: An Audio India Journal

Today's lesson is: There's no point in having a compact digital recorder with you in India if you're just going to leave it in the hotel room. Even if it's just for a casual stroll around town on the final night of your trip and there are no plans for anything other than a look at some tchotchkes stalls and dinner. 'Cause then what do you do when you notice a little stage set up along the Cochin beachfront and some guys in colorful Keralan Backwaters village dress testing out mics and tuning up some percussion instruments? And then how do you feel as the performance, a free presentation by a local folk culture collective, provides some of the most intriguing, entrancing, rustic-hewed sounds -- the drums, hand cymbals and both solo and group chanting supplemented by bells worn by the dancers acting out various tales of life and legends -- you've seen on the trip. And then when you talk to the leader afterward and he, in very broken English, chuckles a bit when you ask if they have any CDs or anything. Not to mention that the introductions given to the performances were by and large unintelligible to us, so we didn't even really know what we saw of the great varieties of the region's folk culture.

Well, you just be glad that you finally remembered that your digital camera has a video setting and you were able to preserve at least a short bit of this great experience as a souvenir. And be glad that you had that digital audio recorded with you for a bunch of other remarkable encounters in the preceding weeks.



India was the debut of a new digital recorder, a Sony PCM-D50 -- a recently marketed version of higher-end "professional" models that is affordable to the layperson. It's a bit bulkier (and therefore harder to secrete away) than the MiniDisc that was accompaniment on several previous journeys, but it has much greater ease of operation and terrific built-in mics. It's all flash drive and no moving parts (4 gigs of built-in memory, which will handle as much as 12 hours of recording, plus a slot for a card to greatly expand capacity if needed), operates on just four AA batteries that are good for about 20 hours of use (no recharging needed). It's basically a point-and-click recording studio.

The Bull Temple in Bangalore is fascinating, a large black carving of Nandi, the mode of transport and loyal companion to the god Shiva -- all the more enticing for the adjacent temple to Ganesh, in which the statue, we read, was often covered in 110 kilos of butter. Butter Ganesh! Our driver-guide insisted this was not true, that the butter adornment happened only very rarely on only on very special occasions. Oh, he said once we got there, what do you know? Butter Ganesh! At the Bull Temple itself, though, we were readily welcomed in the small procession of supplicants, a priest marking out foreheads with ash and another ladling a little sacred water into our hands, meant for us to sip and then anoint our heads. But through it all was the gripping sound emanating from the entryway, a young man playing a nadaswaram (a long reed instrument) that resonated through the little semi-enclosed stone and concrete space, another young man next to him chanting Hindu verses. We were on a tight schedule, otherwise I would have camped out there for a while and make a long recording. But still, an audio snapshot captures the power and draw of the sounds, in ways no studio recording could. BYO butter, though. Listen to it below.

Bull Temple


"Giant lizard! Giant lizard!"

Not exactly what you expect to be uttered by an old, half-toothless man in the ruins of Singhagad Fort overlooking the rugged landscape near Pune. But that's exactly what the man, who introduced himself as Sumbhajee, exclaimed before launching into a song detailing the legend of the site in which we were standing.

Our friend Vibha -- who had spent her teen and early adult years in Pune and with her husband, Tyler, was visiting her parents there (and serving as our tireless hosts) -- had given us the capsule tale of Gen. Tanaji Mulasare's valiant recapturing of this strategic post for the great Shivaji Maharaj more than 300 years ago. Sumbhajee added passion and drama to the (supposed) fact, using sweeping arm gestures to underscore points that were lost in language to all but Vibha but clear in power.

Perhaps due to the elation from having gotten this serendipitous encounter digitally preserved (even through the wind whipping up the hillside), I was emboldened to try a couple of the onion pakoras Vibha ordered from a woman in a tarp-topped shack nearby. Though the oil was fresh, she assured us -- changed just two days ago! -- this was exactly the sort of thing we'd been cautioned against. But when they arrived I couldn't resist trying one myself, all the while weighing the gastronomic reward vs. the gastrointestinal risk prospects. The former proved considerable - they were soooo tasty. And the latter? Happy to report there were no negative consequences at all.

Oh, and the giant lizards? Seems that the according to legend, the general's climb up the precipices toward his heroic martyrdom was accompanied and aided by exactly that. "Komodo dragons," suggested Vibha, tentatively. Sure, why not? Listen to Sumbhajee below.

"Giant Lizard"


The city of Pune, despite that history and the relatively cosmopolitan air thanks to being the home to several universities, is not generally on tourist itineraries other than those who might be visiting the Osho Ashram (or "meditation resort," as it's termed on the official Web site) founded by the late, controversial Bhagwan Sri Rashneesh (he of the infamous fleet of Rolls Royces when the operation was based in Oregon some years ago). Oddly, the ashram was about the only variety of spiritual-related site we were unable to visit on one particularly wide-ranging day -- seems you have to have reservations for the expensive and paranoiacally secured facility.

But we did make it to several Hindu temples, a synagogue (built Gothic-style by philanthropist David Sasoon in 1867 and still active but unfortunately closed at the time we were there), a Zoroastrian temple (only members of the insular, Persian-rooted sect are allowed inside, but three members very warmly and charmingly discussed the traditions with us outside), a Sikh temple and a Catholic church (with wedding in progress).

It was the Sikh temple -- the Guru Nanak Darbar Gurudwara -- that provided the sonic treasure, as a service/performance was going on, with a priest accompanied by two men singing and playing harmonium and a third on tabla, a special appearance (so we learned later) of musicians from the Punjab. A gathering of Sikhs might seem intimidating to outsiders, the men in their white turbans and long beards, but rarely have we felt so welcomed as we were here. Not wanting to intrude beyond our presence, we asked one of the men who greeted us as we entered the grounds if it would be fine to record the music. A broad smile and "of course" were the response.

I turned on the device as we walked up the stairs, Tyler and I finding a place near the back of on the men's side, Mary and Vibha heading to the women's side on the right. We sat cross-legged on the matted floor with the rest and let the sounds in the pavilion take us. And it was truly moving, a mix of certainty and perhaps melancholy that in some ways struck the same way as the Eastern Orthodox services encountered in Eastern Europe on other trips had.

Of course, along with the welcome came some curiosity about our presence, as two men sat down next to Tyler and me, smilingly acknowledged us, but then noticed the recorder set at my side. I used some gestures to indicate that I was capturing the sounds. But one of the men, with a graying, scraggly beard and slightly wild (though cheerfully so) look in his eyes, was transfixed by the item and, to my slight distress, picked it up to examine it closely. After a few moments, he seemed satisfied and placed it back down, nodding to me. But he kept his eye on it, particularly interested in how the meter bars expanded and contracted along with the sounds coming from the dais.

Inevitably, he needed to test that phenomenon himself. So suddenly the voices of the performers were joined by another, as the man started singing/chanting -- not so loud as to draw too much attention to himself but loudly enough to have visible impact on the Sony unit's small screen.

And now he is preserved along with the sounds for which the record button had been pressed. Maybe that makes the captured memory less useful to share, but it also makes it oddly more personal. Such are the pleasures and pitfalls of audio vérité. Listen to it below.

Sikh Temple