Pondicherry 2006

One of the great joys of reading is being transported to faraway lands. Incidentally, that’s also one of the great joys of travel. When asked, many travelers will tell you that they prefer the “authentic” experience to packaged tours or attractions—the greatest thrill of travel is to catch a glimpse of a faraway land through a local’s eyes. Reading a book set in the place you are visiting is one of the best ways to achieve that.

In 2006 I visited an old friend in India. I’d never been. Didn’t know the first thing. I knew there would be a lot of down time, both on the plane from Sydney and on busses, traveling from town to town while I was there. I packed several books, of course. One of them was Midnight’s Children by Salman Rushdie.

The story is set in India and revolves around a group of children born on the eve of the Partition. It’s a brilliant story and deservedly won a Pulitzer when it was published in 1981. Safe to say that it would have been a joy to read at any time. However, it was an altogether different experience reading it while sitting on a beach in Mahabalipuram, at a restaurant in Pondicherry, on a deck in Mysore.

There is a passage where a Christian priest is talking to a young Hindu boy and the boy asks what color Jesus was. The priest says something to the effect of, “Blue, of course. Like Krishna.” A great moment. But I was in Pondicherry at the time and had just seen some very old Christian churches with bejeweled friezes of Mary—and in one of them her skin was blue. A detail that would have been fascinating, but was also made delightful by having recently read that passage.

Now I try to read books that are set in, or by authors native to, the places I’m traveling. When I remember, at least. And it doesn’t always work out. As it happens, I don’t really care for Mario Vargas Llosa, so I didn’t pull the trick off in Peru. But reading Oscar Wao in the Dominican Republic was amazing.

For the last month, I’ve been in Buenos Aires. A week or so ago I was absentmindedly walking through Palermo Soho. I had just burned through my reading backlog and was thinking about what I should pick up next when I looked up to see that I was on Jorge Luis Borges Street.