In our little town in Connecticut, “The Last Post” is a shelter for stray cats. And stray cats is what we feel like right about now, on day 158 of this long, long journey around a good part of the globe. Herewith, some highlights from our time in Rome.

Visitors to Santa Maria in Trastevere leave notes beside a statue in the nave. There are printed emails, post-it-notes, proper sealed envelopes, prayers scrawled on receipts, and more — in every language imaginable.

While Rome is among Europe’s most fashionable cities, the homeless population is like that in any other urban area: this particular woman was rather enchantingly attired, but when we took our picture, she wanted remuneration. Our friend Dennis reached in his pocket for some spare change: seconds after we took this picture, she grabbed all of it.

Across the river from Trastevere is the Jewish ghetto, where we strolled one morning while restaurants were setting up for lunch. Hoping to lure pedestrian traffic in a busy district, many Roman restaurants use oversized menus and comic-like figures to pull focus — we’ve seen giant slices of pizza and even an oversized hot dog masquerading as advertising — but the Kosher chef was our favorite.

Now that it’s spring, meals at the Academy are served in the cortile, where the fragrant aroma of climbing jasmine is not to be believed.

We’ve photographed nearly 200 of cinquecentos — the schnauzer of automobiles — in hopes of one day photographing 300 more, so we can publish a book called “500 500s.”

During the week, Fiona does her homework in the Academy bar while peeling fava beans or shelling peas to help out the kitchen staff. (Photo by Nick Barberio.)

Every Saturday morning, she volunteers in the kitchen and often designs the menu.

The colors here, the sun, the clouds and the sky and even the graffiti (Malcolm’s an expert) are astonishing in Rome. As is the food and the churches and the museums and the people and oh, my, GOD the pasta and the olive oil, the prosecco, the cornetti, the markets and the flea markets and the lectures and the concerts. So much to see and do and learn and think about.

But it’s true, what they say: there’s no place like home. And that’s where we’ll be next.

I’ve been putting in an 8-to-10 hour day in the studio lately, working on a series of portraits of the fellows here. They begin with photos Fiona takes on my iPhone — the expressions of the subjects, I have found, are entirely different when being photographed by a child — and then I rework them in Brushes. Once I’ve examined every millimeter and eliminated every pixel, I print them out and paint them for real: the early ones were in gouache on paper, but I’m gradually moving to oil on linen, which I much prefer.

An example of the method that is my madnesss after the jump.

It’s not the kind of work I usually do, but I’ve approached this project like a musician approaches scales. It’s been a difficult but ultimately rewarding exercise, and given my obsession with personal narrative, seems to fit into my ongoing fascination with depicting other peoples’ lives. Meanwhile, I’m learning a lot about color and light and shadow and materials.

When she’s not analyzing exotic candy, Fiona spends a good bit of time in the Academy kitchen, where the amazing Mona Talbott allows kids on Saturday mornings. During the week, while not technically “in” the kitchen, Fiona tends to do quite a bit of her Italian homework sitting at the Academy bar (where Gabriele, the bartender, makes a mean sprumante) and where, more often than not, she can be found shelling peas or fava beans.

When in Rome, you do all sorts of things you might not do at home — like, say, taking a break from shelling fava beans to go see a 1,700-year-old sarcophagus.

Google “lead burrito” and while a few people have actually uploaded heartburn-worthy Mexican food, the more interesting hits lead you to a mummy, discovered near Rome last summer, now resting comfortably here at the Academy. We had a private visit with him this morning (we think it’s a him, but the jury’s still out on this) — a figure wrapped in a lead sleeve, folded burrito-style, and rather beautifully coated in thousand-year rubble. This is how he looked this morning:

It’s hard to describe how magnificent the gardens are now that spring has burst forth, especially the herb and vegetable gardens which produce a bountiful harvest from which we all benefit here at the Academy. That there are archeological wonders just a few feet away makes it all the more amazing.

(Academy kitchen photo by Jane Kriss.)

There once was a girl named Fiona.
Who went ’round the world, then to Roma!
Where she lived by the motto
“You MUST have gelato —
Or leave Rome right now for Daytona!”

The flavors she tried were incredible!
Though the language she barely found credible …
Riso? Straciatella?
Nocciolo? Nutella?
(At least Cappucino was edible!)

So overwhelmed, poor, dear Fiona,
Seeks HELP as she struggles through Roma!
Gelato-holics Anonymous
(And all that’s synonymous)
She’ll pay you in Euro! Or Krona!

(This week’s contest: submit the strangest flavor of ice cream you’ve ever encountered!)

Here’s today’s quiz: which of these is not like the others?

Five years ago, we rented an apartment in Rome, in the Jewish Ghetto, and spent a few weeks here with our children. This afternoon we retraced our steps to the Piazza Mattei, and restaged the same photo we took back when everyone was, well, shorter.

Late this afternoon, we walked past miles of volunteers painting over graffiti in honor of earth day: we were amazed at the gallons of paints, all the regulation Roman colors. In Trastevere as elsewhere, the sun was strong and the swarming population already busy by late afternoon, with restaurants using whatever means they had to attract tired, hungry pedestrians. This sign was our favorite:

The view from our hill, just below the Academy, is always a mesmerizing sight, but tonight it was especially colorful. Hard to imagine clouds of volcanic ash are lingering anywhere near us.

A perfect end to a perfect day, and as it is Saturday, Fiona is especially tired: she gets up early every Saturday to work in the kitchen at the Academy, where she shells fava beans and helps with the really grueling stuff — like baking cookies.

Bill and I gave our official lecture last night, at the magnificent Villa Aurelia, which might just be the most enchanting place I’ve ever been. The gardens are vast and well-tended, with great wafts of wisteria giving way to more manicured paths and arbors and hedges. The villa itself is a vision: pale yellow and regal and elegant, with a terrace offering perhaps one of the most beautiful view of the city.

We spoke for about 50 minutes and answered questions for nearly as much time. The lecture was well-attended, and the Academy hosted a lovely reception after, followed by dinner in the dining room where we all ate and drank splendidly.

Meanwhile, life in Rome continues on in its wonderful Italian way. Fiona’s actual birthday fell on Easter Sunday, and we went with some Academy friends to the one, great local restaurant, where the woman at the next table was turning 90.

Fiona posed with her for a photo, and moments later, the woman’s son filled ALL our glasses with champagne and brought Fiona a huge slice of his mother’s birthday cake. As we got up to leave, he waved to us and called over, “Same time next year?”

We went to an old chocolate factory yesterday to celebrate Fiona’s 12th birthday, which is actually today. The delectations were amazing, and the decor equally so: we were particularly taken with the antique candy molds, hung everywhere, and encompassing an entire social history of their own. (The pistol mold was our favorite, though sadly, no chocolate pistols were for sale during our visit.)

Later, we walked back across the city, down beautiful residential streets where, among random courtyards, you find these amazing fountains:

And in the shop windows, a selection of Easter dresses for toddlers that were confections in themselves:

On the Spanish Steps, the crowds were impressive: tourists, college students, spring break — apparently, all roads lead to Rome, after all.

We didn’t get home until after 9pm, between the busses on their holiday schedule and the crowds in the city, and our desire to walk until we dropped. But the remaining memory is one of chocolate, featured perhaps most accurately in this last picture of Fiona, enjoying a true sugar rush.

While walking through the piazza by the Vatican, we squirmed our way through what could only be the entourage of the man himself: and just like that, there he was, surrounded by bodyguards and photographers and pilgrims and well-wishers, all hoping for a chance to be blessed by the Pope. Suddenly, out of nowhere, a photographer plucks Fiona from the crowd and asks her to come forward!

APRIL FOOLS!

Yesterday, after walking miles through the markets at Porta Portese, we wandered back through Trastevere and found a restaurant still serving lunch. The special of the day — pollo al forno (or roast chicken) — was promoted on a sign on a birdcage, making us wonder: was this the daily special’s former home?

“Mother?” began Princess Hazel Peppermunt.

“Yes, my dear?” replied her mother, Queen Petunia Peppermunt.

“Why do we have such a peculiar last name? Why Peppermunt?”

“What last name would you like to have, Hazel?” asked Petunia, smiling.

“Peppermint.”

“Peppermint! I think that’s even more peculiar than our last name! Just think! ‘Peppermint!’ How strange that would be!”

Just then, King Pablo Peppermunt walked into the room. He started to speak, but he was interupted by his daughter, Hazel.

“Daddy, don’t you think that the last name ‘Peppermint’ is just sensational?”

“Well, speaking of sensational last names, I just decided to change our last name.”

“To what?” asked Hazel.

“Why, to Saltmunt, of course,” replied her father.

Today we spent the beter part of the afternoon with our friend Laura Gratz, whose husband Jon Piasecki was a fellow here at the Academy a few years ago, and whose children go to school back in the Berkshires with Malcolm and Fiona. We walked for hours, from the Gianicolo down into Trastevere, across the river, through the ghetto and over to the Avenino, where we saw the most spectacular views of the city. Later, we visited with some friends of Laura’s who have a four-month old Weimeraner puppy, Pluto, who stole our hearts: Malcolm took dozens of pictures, though few were actually in focus, since Pluto doesn’t sit still with any regularity.

The views everywhere are breathtaking, and you’re constantly aware of the mix of old and new, sky and structure, juxtapositions of ancient buildings with modern custom. In the ghetto, there are these beautiful vistas behind the Teatro Marcello, as in the photo above, where the synagogue appears in the distance. The graffiti is endless, and you really notice it here. Plus, it’s occasionally really funny.

The other thing you can’t help but notice here are the cars, since they’re parked everywhere, making the whole idea of a pedestrian sidewalk something you can’t actually count on. Cars here are often quite tiny, too: some members of our family who will remain nameless have gone a bit gaga over these little Fiats, which are almost as appealing as that little Weimeraner pup. (I said almost.)

We’re getting down to business now that we’re here — not easy as it requires an adjustment for us all, and we’ve been pretty structure-free for a few months, given all the vicissitudes of travel. That said, structure is precisely what we crave, on some basic level. Bill has, for the most part, mastered his technology needs, and Fiona and Malcolm are doing four hours a day of intensive Italian.

As for me, I go to the studio every morning, where I block everything out and work for as long as I can.

I have spent the week setting up the studio, and looking at some of the work I did before I came, and many of the notes I’ve made and photographs I’ve taken during this trip. This is interesting for me now, as I try to evolve to the next step, and want to avoid dictating what I think I should do: rather, my process has its own, built-in iterations, and every drawing I make seems to beget the next. Lots of experiments: some succeed while others fail, and I am keeping a sort of ongoing journal to try to make sense of it all. This counterpoint of painting and writing is enormously gratifying, for some reason, and lets me have a dialogue with myself about what I am making, and why.

Bill and I will give a lecture at the Academy on April 8, and I’ll try to incorporate some of this work when we do so.

Meanwhile, my birthday yesterday took precedence over our daily routines, and we went to the ghetto in Trastevere where we had the most glorious deep-fried Jerusalem artichokes — which might just be the single most delicious thing on the planet, period. As we sat there watching all the big, Italian families carrying on with their own long (and LOUD) Sunday lunches, our waiter brought me over a little surprise confection with a candle. Seconds after this photograph was taken, it was snatched away by my hungry children, who inhaled it on the spot: for reviews, please direct your queries to them, since I never tasted it.

After lunch, we walked over to the Pantheon, which remains as exquisite as ever, with its giant oculus giving way to the grey skies above. But even the streets are exquisite, with surprises everywhere, especially if you love signage.

It was ridiculously crowded on a Sunday afternoon, with tourists and students and everywhere, it seemed, people eating gelato. Bill and I were surprised by the paucity of ice cream choices at our local supermarket, until it dawned on us that nobody eats ice cream at home, and really, why would you? We stopped to get some for the children, who have apparently vowed to one another never to repeat a flavor while they’re here. (Fiona, naturally, is keeping a tally.)

This was the view tonight at about 6pm, at the top of the Via Garibaldi, below the American Academy in Rome, where we arrived last night and will be living until June. From the Janiculum, you wind your way down to Trastevere, where the narrow streets give way to exceptionally beautiful alleys and courtyards, with gardens and fountains and cobblestone streets as far as you can see.

The main building at the Academy houses the main offices and bar and dining room, as well as housing and studios for many of the fellows and residents. The ancillary buildings are equally intoxicating — particularly the Casa Rustica, behind the Academy gardens — but there is something about the McKim, Mead and White main building that’s just breathtaking. It begins when you walk through the main gates and toward the sun-drenched courtyard.

Our apartment is across the street, in the Villa Chiaraviglio: a lovely pied-a-terre with exposure on two sides: we’re particularly grateful for internet access and hot water in the shower, as well as a sunny balcony where Fiona and I plan to grow herbs. (It’s hard not to be inspired by Mona Talbott and her team at the Rome Sustainable Food Project, who provide the local, organic nourishment served up in the Academy’s dining room — not to mention the intoxicating lure of all that Italian olive oil.)

As far as icing on the cake is concerned, we also have a studio. Unlike WInterhouse — with its barking dogs and buzzing phones and its inevitable deadlines — here, the studio is an oasis of quiet. It serves no client, no outward purpose. It’s a blank canvas, the physical embodiment of time — free time. Ten and a half weeks, to be precise, of free time. It is a gift like no other we can imagine: scary and thrilling and overwhelming all at once. But priceless.

Number 1: Eggs! (fried, or sunny side up?)

Number 2: Waffles! (Where’s the maple syrup?)

Number 3: This is a classic thing that dutch children eat: it’s basically different flavored sprinkles that you eat with butter and big round crackers (called rusks)

Today marks the halfway point in our 29,000 mile odyssey around the globe. 83 days in, 83 to go. Herewith, some random observations about and pictures of our last week in Amsterdam, readjusting to winter, visiting with friends, touring museums and eating far too well and too much, beginning with a birthday lunch on Monday at De Kas, where the greenhouse supplies much, if not all of the menu.

Celebrating my birthday (in 10 days) and Fiona’s (in about three weeks) as well the birthdays of my friend Laura Tarrish and her beautiful daughter, Olivia, the four of us headed out via tram to this restaurant, located in a park at the other end of the city. We each ordered a glass of champagne and some organic pear and apple juice for Fiona, who, true to form, took hers in a champagne flute.

Later, we went to the purse museum, where the chairs in the entryway each look like handbags.

A day later, we went to the Rijksmuseum and the Van Gogh Museum, and had tea at the Vertigo Cafe in the Film Museum. Later, I went with Malcolm and Fiona to the Anne Frank House where Fiona, who has been reading the famous diary, expressed disappointment that the house seems overly museum-i-fied. (We all agreed.) Fiona was delighted to find, however, that there is a newspaper here with her initials.

Oddly, even though we have a great connection here in A’dam, we are having great difficulties with WordPress loading images. (Bizarrely, we had no problems in India where we had terrible connections.) We’ll post more when we figure this out.

Amsterdam is enchanting in every way, We’d forgotten that people leave their curtains open, so you sometimes mistake a restaurant or a shop for what is simply someone’s lovely home. At twilight it is especially entertaining to look into the lives of the lucky inhabitants of this charming city. Spring is just around the corner here, with bright green grass and snowdrops just about up.

It may not be the blizzard conditions our friends are enduring back in the Northeastern United States, but here in Amsterdam it is very, very cold — especially coming from the other side of the equator, as we were. But it is beautiful here nonetheless, with bright blue skies, exquisite canal houses and tulip bulbs for sale on every corner. Everyone looks like Bill (and my father, who arrived yesterday morning). And of course our blue-eyed children, who felt so “other” in India and Asia.

We are all thrilled by the toasted cheese sandwiches we’ve been blissfully inhaling since we arrived, best enjoyed with a cup of steaming, milky tea served with biscotti and the occasional divine piece of chocolate. Of course, chocolate is deserving of its own post — perhaps by the candy expert in our family — but here’s a sneak peek, spotted in a bakery window yesterday afternoon: chocolate shoes!

We had a cocktail party here on Friday night, where Fiona charmed the crowd by refilling drinks and made a new friend — Massimo Vignelli. All a warm-up, as it turns out, for yesterday when we went to a spectacular winery for lunch, and we sat beside Martha Stewart. (And Massimo too.)

The goodbye lunch for all the Design Indaba speakers was held on Saturday afternoon at Waterkloof, a magnificent modern structure with massively high ceilings and wall to wall windows offering sweeping views over the vineyards and beyond, out to Gordon’s Bay.

Eames Demetrios— grandson of Charles and Ray — was seated with his wife at the Martha Stewart table, and they gave Fiona a set of House of Cards, whereupon Fiona immediately began building these giant, cascading structures that only momentarily pulled the focus away from the enchanting views. Ms. Stewart glanced over and pointed this out to her dining companions.

Much spirited discussion ensued over the prospect of an 11-year old getting an internship at Martha Stewart Omnimedia — and Senior Vice President Kevin Sharkey tossed his business card our way. Fiona, for her part, barely noticed.

This Indaba sendoff was the perfect ending to our two weeks here: beautiful, magical, sensational on every level. We will miss it here and are already plotting our return. We leave tomorrow night for Amsterdam.

My mother adored places like the Mount Nelson Hotel in Cape Town, which boasts (among its other delights) perhaps the world’s most luxurious high tea. My father has wonderful memories of their trips here, and therefore insisted we make a pilgrammage: and so we did. We opted for morning tea as it is a bit more in our price range, but is served nevertheless on the terrace overlooking the garden. Tea is taken rather seriously here, and once selected, is brought to your table in a small glass teapot alongside a timer, so that each pot is steeped to perfection.

But that’s nothing compared to what comes next: a small sampling of what they brought us, after the jump.

Our tray was covered with goodies, apparently only a fraction of the afternoon fare, but to us it was pure bliss: sweet and savoury, served on silver and porcelain, and we were the only people there. Naturally, we all dove in at once — and in entirely different directions, I might add. I think it’s a pretty telling personality indicator that while I reached for the spinach quiche, Malcolm made a beeline for the carrot cake. Fiona, true to form, zeroed right in on the chocolate options. All three of them.

This is the face of the little penguin who took offense when we took his picture and got just a little too close with the camera. Which, thanks to the little penguin, now has a little DENT in the lens.

But that’s not all.

We drove today from Cape Town all the way down the peninsula, past Boulders Beach (home to hundreds of African penguins) to the Cape of Good Hope. It is a long but breathtaking drive along the mountains, past the Twelve Apostles and into Table Mountain National Park, where we stopped to photograph the magnificent view.

Moments later we stopped to look at a family of baboons who were playing on top of someone’s car.

While we did so, some of them waddled over and managed to not only climb onto OUR car, but actually let themselves in, too.

Before we knew it they were everywhere: coffee spilled, pawprints on the seats, the biggest one going through my handbag where he rejected the lipstick but was pretty taken with the South African Airways bag of miniature cosmetics. Another one grabbed a small vial of henna (inset, right) that one of the children planned on bringing home for a friend, and a few of them grabbed a stash of pills.

We recovered the passports and Bill, brave soul that he is, chased the ones with the pills, and managed to rescue one of the bottles.

The rest of the afternoon passed without incident, and we were rewarded with numerous ostrich sightings. They’re huge, by the way — gravity-defying. (Not unlike the dent in my camera, come to think of it.)

The market nearest our apartment here in Cape Town turns out to have about three aisles dedicated entirely to candy. Most of the candy is not blog-worthy, but the things that are blog-worthy are very very blog-worthy.

For example, there is Toffifee.

People who know me very well call me Fee. However, not many toffies know me well enough to call me Fee. Which makes me wonder: who does this toffee think she is?

All across Asia and Africa there are people posing in goofy costumes, waiting for you to play the tourist card and take their picture, whereupon they hit you up for cash. I proudly resisted the gorgeous saree-clad woman in Bombay who was walking her dwarf monkey, but for reasons I am hard put to explain, the egg man got me.

The whole city has charmed us beyond expectation: the weather — changeable but wonderful, sunny and dry, cool at night; the food — fresh, eclectic, fantastic; the wine — in endless and varied supply; the architecture, the people, the beaches, the mountains, everything. We’ve been walking everywhere, except when we are driving (we rented a car) and I am proud to report that we grow more confident as drivers with each passing day. (Driving on the left takes a bit of adjustment.)

Tuesday evening we had dinner with Ravi Naidoo, design empressario and overall sweetheart who heads Interactive Africa which produces, among many other things, Design Indaba, where Bill will be speaking next week. We met his exquisite, Lena Horn-esque wife and beautiful children — two boys, one of whom is bringing Malcolm to his school tomorrow for show and tell.( A blog-worthy event if ever there was one.)

Yesterday, we saw protesters outside the city parliament, who Malcolm photographed from the car. We had life-changing sushi and walked for miles, spending quite a bit of time in an African music store: while Malcolm explored South African rap and dub, Fiona and I were particularly taken with a set of guitars we saw, made from cans of motor oil.

Recycling here, as in India, is epic. We’re photographing examples everywhere and plan to post them together when we’ve achieved critical mass. Stay tuned.

Who could resist a candy bar called NOSH?

In the 1970s, my Mother and her sister were staying in Rome for a few days with their parents when they came across this candy. “They were the fizzy kind,” my Mom tells me, which led to a brilliant idea: they took the cola-flavored Charm and dropped it into a glass of water, attempting to make Coke! “The Charm fizzed up,” she remembers, “and it even turned the water brown. But when we tasted it, it was terrible. It tasted like melted candy in water!”

We found Charms here in Cape Town at a store along the waterfront, and while they weren’t the fizzy kind, we repeated the experiment. And it failed again!

Yesterday began in the pouring rain, in a Jeep, water sloshing everywhere, a scene utterly miserable in every way — but then we stumbled on a huge herd of buffalo … an astonishing sight, especially as so many of them resemble Teddy Roosevelt.

As we headed back to camp, the sky cleared and we spotted one last majestic elephant: a perfect ending to our four day odyssey in the bush. Later, we were driven two hours down to Nelspruitt, flew to Johannesburg and caught another plane to Cape Town where we were greeted by Design Indaba’s smiling driver: Malcolm photographed the charming sign he brought to greet us at the airport.

Safari life is bookended by two drives — one early and one late — that maximize the light, minimize the heat, and catch the animals grazing in their natural habitats. We’re up by 5:30, in the jeep by 6am and not back until half past nine when we’re rewarded with a spectacular breakfast. The morning is quiet here at the lodge, where we work, swim and eat lunch on a veranda overlooking a grassy valley where elephants roam. We’re back in the jeep again by 4:30 and not back until after sunset. This is unlike anything else: even though we live in the country and see our occasional share of bears and bobcats, nothing compares to the bounty of this experience.

More under photos, updated as we are able.

This is the face that greeted us on arrival in MalaMala yesterday, where the air is pure, the sun is hot and the landscape is nothing short of breathtaking. We’ll be doing two jeep safaris a day between now and Sunday, and posting photographs as much as we can. Goal here is to see the “Big Five” (rhino, elephant, buffalo, lion and leopard) and we saw all but the buffalo on our first drive: but there’s so much more — from birds to trees to learning to decode pawprints to golden spiders and technicolor insects, plus the most gargantuan termite hills known to man.

What we caught on video last night, however, warrants a word of caution, as it was not, um, what we planned on when we imagined the educational benefits of this trip for our children. Video — not for children below a certain age — after the jump.

Mating Dance from helfand + drenttel on Vimeo.

Upon arriving Saturday in Mumbai, we visited with the creative team at Umbrella, a talented design agency — and again we saw work that was unusually rich and vibrant. The funny thing is that we met founder Bhupal Ramnathkar (known to all as Ramu) through Facebook: he follows our status reports. A highly successful advertising creative director, he’s created a design-focused boutique firm that does lovely work — unusually thoughtful and visually sophisticated. Ramu was a very helpful and gracious host in Mumbai.

Umbrella’s creative director, Deven Sansare, (pictured above, walking us all through a presentation of some of their work) kindly invited Fiona to his house in the fascinating Banda neighborhood to play with his daughter for an afternoon, a treat for her after weeks and weeks in the company of adults. They played hopscotch, tag and badminton — all part of international kid language.

There is no greater loss than the loss of a child — more unspeakable, still, when such a tragedy is the result of a violent crime. But it was a small reporting detail in this story that got me.

“The girl lived with her parents, who are flower sellers,” it read. “They lived on the footpath near the railway station.”

This is the part of India that I find it nearly impossible to explain. More than poverty, what’s so unfathomable is the sheer density of life here, the streets packed with endless numbers of people, the scarcity of sidewalks — as though so much pedestrian activity has literally worn them away. The lack of shoes. The lack of water.

The fact that to live on a footpath constitutes an address.

But this is only one of the countless facets of life in this astonishing place. Elsewhere in the paper are pages of matrimonial classifieds, servicing a significant percentage of the population who subscribe to the notion of the arranged marriage. The alternative is called a “love marriage” which, while engaged in by many, apparently claims a higher percent of divorces. Its detractors (we’ve met a few) recite such statistics proudly, adding that professional matchmaking boasts a higher long-term success rate. There’s a funny conflation of old-world etiquette with modern-day efficiency in these ads: families looking for a suitable match for a daughter might list her advanced degrees along with, say, her fair complexion; a prospective groom might indicate his family’s net worth, while simultaneously seeking a bride with an MBA who excells in Gujarati cooking. Women reveal age, height and even weight, while men indicate relative positions of power by listing schools attended and jobs held. Food, for everyone, looms large: whether you are veg or non-veg appears to be a major deal-breaker. Marriage is very much considered a union of families, here —which explains why family standing and financial status are clearly stated in the classifieds — but that’s just the beginning. Actual meetings between familiy members (though not, it should be noted, the prospective bride and groom) typically ensue, whereupon discussions about shared values and assets are conducted. Family harmony is key. As is the astrological match: you can get it all worked out perfectly, but at the eleventh hour, discover that your future mate is a Scorpio with Capricorn rising and well, all bets are off. (Our guide in Rajasthan, who proudly announced that he was Rajput, told us one night over dinner about his own wedding last spring — all six days of it—and mentioned in passing that he didn’t even meet his soon-to-be-wife in person until day five.)

And all of this underscores the other part of India — the grand scale of the palaces, the unbridled excess of the colors, the centuries-old bling. I am not the first nor shall I be the last to point out the impossibility, for Westerners, to comprehend the simultaneous presence of both.

A good question for which there are so many answers. Beyond the unbelievable tradition of handicraft here, Indian culture in general is saturated in color. At NID, I observed that design students would introduce color in their explorations much, much earlier than my students would in the United States: it is something of a generalization to say this, but typically, students in Western design programs tend to work to resolve form first and add color later. (In the case of, say, a corporate identity program, students are generally asked to create a mark that works in black and white, small and large, in print and on screen, and eventually, budget permitting, in color.)

Not so in India where color is everything. I have become accustomed these last weeks to this shift, having seen students’ explorations in color, witnessed the brilliant palettes of the work at Elephant, the fabrics in the shop windows, the sarees, the signage, everything.

Internet firewalls here are tricky: the four of us are sitting in a cafe with WiFi as I post this, the first time we’ve successfully been online in five days. (Internet access in Pune was spectacular: we wish we’d stayed longer.)

We slept on the boat, and in the late afternoon, took a smaller boat to cruise through the narrow canals where we watched people using the riverways for pretty much everything from laundry to dishwashing to bathing. A group of children heading home from school followed us most of the way, calling out to us from time to time in loud, if hesitant English, asking for pens. Must be a shortage of those in their school, or there’s a hot resale market for them here? Maybe both.

About six in the evening we docked for the night with a few other houseboats in a large lake. All the boatmen took an hour off to play volleyball, before making us an amazing dinner, with napkins folded like peacocks inside our glasses. Before we docked the next morning, one of them gave Fiona a lesson in how to make one,. Then we took their picture.

One last thing: it’s hard to explain a lifestyle in which a person lives with their family in a small hut, wearing little clothing and no shoes, washing dishes and fishing for their meals and bathing in a river that is also their means of transportation. By Western, consumerist standards this sounds like a limited life, and while it is indeed provincial, there’s something incredibly joyful about it. Hints here and there of modernism — we saw quite a few satellite dishes, and most people on the backwaters seem to have cell phones (visually, an odd incongruity to say the least) but it all works in this kind of elegant, self-sufficient way. Everyone knows each other, nobody is tuned out on microphones and jogging to relieve stress, it’s just this well-tuned system of people living and working and making a life from the land and in the water. Pretty incredible, actually.

Cochin, at least the part we’re staying in, is the first relatively quiet place we’ve seen in India. Once the center of the spice trade, there are still numerous spice merchants, and this morning we passed an alleyway so filled with piles of fresh ginger that we started coughing from all the ginger dust. The old part of the city was once the Jewish quarter and is actually called Jew Town. We visited the synagogue (as well as a church, nearby, where Vasco de Gama is buried) with an upstairs area for women congregants, but apparently there are only about 8 or 10 Jews left here, so the women sit downstairs now.

“Chulbuli Imli! Chulbuli Imli!” The crowd chorused in anticipation. As each second went by, the cheers were getting louder and louder. “CHULBULI IMLI! CHULBULI IMLI!”

As soon as the clock struck one, the curtain opened and there stood the one and only Chulbuli Imli. She had her iconic pink hat on, which she supposedly never took off. This idolized peanut-shaped woman was a superstar on the island of Hajmola*, a small peninsula off the coast of Egypt.

When I first bought this, I assumed it was a peanut-flavored candy, but then I was told that it was not peanut flavored, but in fact, tamarind flavored!

* Please note that Hajnola is not a real place.

A friend wisely told us before we left that the worst moments would make the best stories. We’ve had our share of these moments — freebasing Pepto Bismol, cursing the internet blackouts — but today was the opposite, filled with adventure and sunshine and surprises — good ones — at every turn.

I told Fiona that on some cold, dark winter morning next year, when she’s utterly miserable and tired and rushing out the door to get to school, she should remember this day, which began with a sumptuous breakfast buffet that included CHOCOLATE MILKSHAKES, live sitar music, and less than an hour later, an elephant ride up the mountain to a fort. All before 10am.

Our elephant, Number 72, was named Lucky — though we didn’t find him at all Lucky, trekking up and down those hot steps all day long. (But so sweet, with his little painted trunk.) We, on the other hand, had a blast.

Apparently, this was how royalty used to get around the fort, and in a forward thinking design maneuver, there are ramps everywhere which were apparently designed so that the Queen could be wheeled up and down, since her jewelry was so cumbersome. (These are good problems to have, we think.) She was Queen by virtue of marrying the King, but he later took another eleven wives. Yikes.

The amount of hawking and haggling outside the fort was impressive (and carries throughout the city) but there were occasional moments that were noteworthy — among them, a handsome dwarf selling wooden blocks for block printing. (Jaipur is famous for this.) It resembles batik, and is amazing to watch, actually, as the registration of each color is completely done by eye.

We later visited a store with a textile operation that included live demonstrations of block printing, as well as single thread rug weaving, a process so taxing on the eyes that artisans only work three hours a day: it takes approximately eight months to complete a rug this way.

At lunch, there was more live music, and since we ate early, we were the only people being serenaded. Fiona had a quick music lesson, though I suspect the instrument in question is not so easy to come by back in the States.

We spent the afternoon braving the crowds of haggling merchants, whose prices fluctuate with rather astonishing randomness. (One became angry when I walked away, shouting after me, “You’ve broken into my heart!”) A little girl danced by our car in a hula hoop, begging for cash: her mother perched nearby with her other siblings, while she performed: she couldn’t have been more than 5 or 6.

Our guide went into a lengthy explanation of the mafia-like syndicate driving the beggars in Delhi — information we heeded, but it didn’t make it any easier to ignore her. She was really beautiful, and so little. Heartbreaking.

The village of Shahpura sits about halfway between Udaipur and Jaipur in the rural hills of Rajasthan. The streets are filled with vegetable markets and people selling everything from spices to shoes. There are men in amazing turbans (color palettes and tying techniques vary, we learned, according to their castes) and women balancing their baskets on their heads and their children on their hips.

We stayed in Shahpura for a few days this week, at an exquisite garden palace, a family home filled with portraits and photographs of the family who built it in the late nineteenth century, and who still run it. There is an immense organic garden that supports the kitchen, and the entire place is overrun by hundreds of chirping parakeets. The entire experience was straight out of Merchant Ivory.

As it happens everywhere we go in India, we were stared at when we went into town, and children raced up to Malcolm and Fiona to get a better look at them. Close to where we stayed, a group of children were playing in front of their house with their baby goat. One of them ran over to us and put it into Fiona’s arms. Then they gathered around her to have their photos taken.

Early one morning we took a jeep safari, which took us out of town to a farm about 12 kilometers away, where we drove through mango groves and saw baby owls. As we are learning here in India, every outing is an excuse to stop for tea: ours was served right under the mango trees.

We drove out in the jeep once again in the late afternoon to a 400-year old fort that’s been essentially abandoned for at least a decade. (The family who owned the place where we were staying sold it to the town for one rupee: they didn’t know what to do with it, so after a few years, they sold it back to the family for the same amount.) It was a spectacular place, over 90 meters across, with ramparts and internal courtyards and astonishing views of the surrounding countryside where we watched women in sarees walking their flocks of sheep and cows. Once again, we were served tea — hot and sweet masala chai — which we drank while we watched the setting sun. Magical.

Here are more henna pictures, as promised! My mentor, Meena, has been teaching me how to eat with my hands, which most people do in India. That explains the finger bowl in this next picture.

By the steps of the temple in Udaipur, men and women pose for pictures while awaiting a handout. (We did the former but not the latter.) Inside the temple, a group sat chanting and playing music with handmade instruments —tambourines and bells. The temple was built in the mid-sixteenth century and sits at the center of the city’s bustling marketplace, where we were particularly taken with the sellers of miniatures. One man gave us a demonstration, and FIona and I were mesmerized by, among other things, his paintbrush made of squirrel hair.

The sun blazes all day here and the sky is a saturated blue. Like Ahmedabad, the streets in Udaipur are heavily trafficked by swirling pedestrians and rickshaws and cows. But the palaces are something different: epic in scale, serene and majestic, they’re other-worldly. (We’ll post more photos when we have a better internet connection.) We’re in Devi Garh now, worthy of its own post, enroute to Shahpura this morning. Details to follow.

Words fail.

I think I am having a midlife crisis. And loving every second of it.

I have been looking at textiles and fabric and handcraft and form and rethinking everything I have ever known about design and about making things. And about people and families and shelter. About need and space. About delight and joy. And about what constitutes beauty.

Not to overstate the obvious, but the approach to form and recycling and reuse here in India is at once formally exquisite and profoundly utilitarian. (Okay, maybe not the plastic dresses I’m showing here, but bear with me: it really is.) This is a longer subject I intend to write about for Design Observer and will post about here as I do. There are many facets to this idea and the multiple processes that support it, but at its core, it represents a fundamental sustainability that is at once economically viable, environmentally intelligent, and just, simply, beautiful.

Floyd and Fritz, who are brothers and buddies (and peacocks) tend to busy themselves by trying to impress their five female neighbors (also peacocks) — Fannie, Fleur, Fern, Frieda, and Florence.

“Hey, lovely ladies!” called Floyd one recent afternoon. “You girls are especially stunning today! How about a date at the canteen?”

“Get lost, Floyd!” sighed Fern. “We don’t want to go out with you. We want to go out with Pierre!”

Pierre, a handsome playboy of the western branches, quickly darted past them. He whistled at the ladies and smoothed down his feathers. Fannie, Fleur, Fern, Frieda, and Florence practically fainted. ”He’s so unbelievably gorgeous!” marveled Florence.

“I don’t understand what’s so great about him. You girls have never even exchanged words with that vain poser,” mumbled Floyd as he stalked away in disgust.

Suddenly, Floyd had a brilliant idea. The one thing that Floyd could do —but Pierre couldn’t — was to fan his feathers!

“Hey, lovely ladies!” Floyd called again. “Watch this!”

And with all his might, Floyd stuck his fancy feathers high into the air. He stayed like this for as long as he possibly could, but soon, he ran out of strength and returned his feathers to their natural position.

Floyd turned to Fannie, Fleur, Fern, Frieda, and Florence. “How did you girls like that?” he preened.

“Don’t be such a show-off, Floyd.” retorted Fannie angrily. “Pierre would never act like that!”

“Don’t you DARE compare me to that jerk, Pierre!” yelled Floyd.

“Jeez, Floyd,” sneered Fleur. “Stop being so bossy. You’ll never get a girl acting like that.”

And with that, Floyd mumbled something about the bathroom as he stalked away, defeated.

Today, I got henna! Henna is a reddish-orange dye that is made from the leaves of the henna plant. Here is Ahmedabad, it is known as mehndi. One of the ways to use henna is to take it and make decorative designs on both your hands and feet. It typically stays on for about two weeks. I’ll post an updated photo tomorrow.

There is a daily walk that leaves at 8am and takes you through the old walled city of Ahmedabad, and finally, after being in India for two weeks, we managed to rally everyone early this morning and actually go. The tour begins at a temple and wanders through the narrow alleys in the early hours while people are getting up and starting their day. We saw people peering down from us at their windows, men shaving, shy women preparing breakfast, and busy pedestrians annoyed by our presence. They scrambled past us on motorbikes and elbowed through to get to their chaiwallah, or to the spice merchant, or in many cases, to school.

The architectural history here is vibrant and eclectic — occasional strains of British influence amidst the elaborate carved woodwork of the Hindi temples and the Muslim Mosques — and everywhere there are images of my favorite Hindu deity, Ganesha, the remover of obstacles.

At the Temple, we arrived at a busy time, and in keeping with much of the custom here in India, the women pray in a different area than the men. It was the same way at the Mosque a while later, and we toured several Jain Temples, where photographs were not allowed, and where you had to walk backwards to the entrance, lest you turn your back on a deity or idol.

Further on through the old town, past the pols, small shops began to open as the sun got higher and stronger. Blackboards are used widely here, and one merchant used several, which, in addition to hanging wares and baskets in front, left him a very small window opening form which to conduct business.

As we headed into the market itself, there were distinct zones of activity, among them, the stationers, with supplies that to our modern eyes looked extraordinary and rather endearingly dated. There were spices and bracelets and flowers and produce, with merchants toting their wares on their heads, their motorbikes, the occasional rickshaw and, my personal favorite, cows and goats. This twosome in particular caught my eye.

In their typical fashion, many children ran up to us and stared, often posing for photographs. Impossible to resist, as always.

Take squatting: we saw this in Vietnam, too, and it is everywhere in India, making for an entire civilization of activity below the knee. People talking, cooking, eating, playing cards, cleaning pots and pans, taking apart air conditioners — and I’m only reporting on activities we’ve witnessed in the last 24 hours. Squatting is not gender-specific, and even the elderly are good at it.

At street level, pedestrians and cars and rickshaws and busses vie with dogs and cats and cows and camels and nobody pays any mind to traffic signals or, for that matter, lanes. They drive on the left here, but you wouldn’t know, as people seem to do as they please, and the proximity of one vehicle to the next makes your head spin. Ditto the cows.

Slightly higher up are the peacocks, who walk slowly and perch on railings and the tops of walls. If they fly it is a short distance, and their wingspan is tremendous. We’ve got two male peacocks in residence by our guest house (Fiona has christened them Floyd and Fritz) who cavort with a harem of girl birds who sun themselves in the afternoon among the bamboo branches, at or above waist-level.

One level up from the peacocks are the monkeys, acrobatic and goofy and not infrequently, loud. (Their cries are a sort of high pitched whine: imagine a cross between a baby and a cow.) They swing from branches into the trees, crouch there for mid-afternoon naps and hang out on rooftops (including ours) watching the world go by. Today I literally spent twenty minutes watching them eat, sleep, play and swing from tree to tree, all at or above the third floor level, where they’re clearly in charge.

Finally, there are the birds at twilight. At about 6:15, the chanting begins from the local mosques, and this is their cue to go to town: thousands of them swing around and through the uppermost branches, and into the sky. Just as the sun sets, the smaller ones retire from duty, and the bigger birds take over. And then it is, as Bill says, utterly prehistoric. And magical. And then it starts all over again.

Fiona did her part last night by taking it upon herself to fill the blackboard in the lecture hall where we were speaking. She’s now offering her services for conferences and lectures and her fee, she tells me, is quite reasonable — although her brother has advised her to charge what our lawyers would charge. Wonder where he got that idea?

Tonight at 5:30, Bill and I will give a lecture about our work at Winterhouse. We asked our new friend, Satya Rajpurohit to design a poster: he’s been working with Peter Bilak and recently released the Hindi version of Fedra. We called it “Post Ulm” because there’s actually an opening in the gallery of work from Ulm happening just before it. The “Post-Client” thing, however, is pure Bill.

It was a fascinating two days exploring how social entrepreneurs grow social enterprises, “approaching the needs of the poor and vulnerable in a business-like manner,” to quote the definition used by Vijay Mahajan. Especially noteworthy was a passionate talk by Harish Hande, a social entrepreneur in the solar energy zone who has customized energy solutions for over 125,000 households. The distinction he makes is between solutions based on needs versus wants, on what is specifically required in communities and households versus created by marketing and standardization.

There’s a settlement on the other side of the wall from where we are living — protected here on campus — and apparently the little stone dwellings house families who have handed down squatting rights over generations. Each time we walk back to the main gate (we’re at the other end of campus) Malcolm asks if we can walk through the settlement, as the people are, well, nicer there.

And he’s right. I’ve become fascinated with their micro-culture: they all watch out for each other, grandmothers washing babies while their daughters cook dinner, literally squatting by pots over fires made from kindling amassed by the older children. An odd goat or donkey wanders by, or a cow. Dogs everywhere, wild and perpetually nursing pups, truly — endless numbers of pups everywhere — that bring an entirely new definition to cuteness: they burrow in the dust by the side gate of the school and sleep in piles at night, trying to stay warm.

Outside the settlement, the world is different. The other night, enroute via rickshaw to a restaurant, a little boy of no more than 7 or 8 came up to us and tried to sell us some lame toy. We did as we’ve been instructed to do, meaning we waved him off, and then as a joke I started speaking to him in English, asking if his mother knew he was out in the street barefoot at all hours selling toys? Fiona laughed, as did I, at the sheer preposterousness of it all — me hiding my pain through a lame attempt at humor, and the weirdness of seeing a barefoot child hawking plastic toys in an intersection at night — when a strange thing happened. The boy kept on keeping on, as an editor friend of mine used to say, but as he did so he leaned against my leg (remember that rickshaws are open on the sides) and that little kid gesture — you know, the way children of a certain age treat adults like furniture? Well, that just about undid me.

Luckily the light changed and we were off, or I might just have thrown in the towel and adopted him on the spot.

Bungee Jumping in the Himalayas from helfand + drenttel on Vimeo.

Sadly, the gum itself is not amazing, but the idea of chocolate gum is so ingenious that I would give it a thumbs up.

Twenty years ago when Bill was last in India, he had some of his favorite clothes copied by a local tailor for a fraction of the price such work would cost in the United States. Since our arrival here a week ago, several people here in Ahmedabad recommended the same tailor, so we knew it had to be worth a visit: and while slightly more expensive than it once was, it’s no less of an adventure, beginning with getting from the tailor shop to the fabric shop: the tailor himself drove us in his family vehicle. He told us that he usually travels with his wife in the passenger car, one child behind him and the other wedged in between, whereupon Fiona took her seat in the middle, seatbelt-free and swooning with joy.