I Am Coming Back To New York

An Honest Politician Has No Goodies To Toss Around. This Limits His Effectiveness Profoundly, Because Political Power In India Is Dispersed Throughout A Multi-tiered Federal Structure; A Local Official Who Has Not Been Paid Off Can Sometimes Stop A Billion-dollar Project.

With Their Tinted Windows Up, The Cars Of The Rich Go Like Dark Eggs Down The Roads Of Delhi. Every Now And Then An Egg Will Crack Open A Woman's Hand, Dazzling With Gold Bangles, Stretches Out An Open Window, Flings An Empty Mineral Water Bottle Onto The Road And Then The Window Goes Up, And The Egg Is Resealed.

Greenwich Village Always Had Its Share Of Mind Readers, But There Are Many More These Days, And They Seem To Have Moved Closer To The Mainstream Of Life In The City. What Was Crazy 10 Years Ago Is Now Respectable, Even Among The Best-educated New Yorkers.

Too Much Of Indian Writing In English, It Seemed To Me, Consisted Of Middle-class People Writing About Other Middle-class People - And A Small Slice Of Life Being Passed Off As An Authentic Portrait Of The Country.

A Rich Man's Body Is Like A Premium Cotton Pillow, White And Soft And Blank. ''ours'' Is Different. My Father's Spine Was A Knotted Rope, The Kind That Women Use In Villages To Pull Water From Wells; The Clavicle Curved Around His Neck In High Relief, Like A Dog's Collar; Cuts And Nicks And Scars, Like Little Whip Marks In His Flesh, Ran Down His Chest And Waist, Reaching Down Below His Hip Bones Into His Buttocks. The Story Of A Poor Man's Life Is Written On His Body, In A Sharp Pen.