I’m continuing my US State Department sponsored speaking tour of India.  Yesterday I spoke in “tiny” Raipur – a state capital with a population of over one million, which doesn’t rate a single mention in my Frommer Guide to India.  My lecture was organized by Cartoon Watch Magazine and its cartoonist editor, the gracious Triambak Sharma.

I traveled from Raipur to Delhi to Agra to see the Taj Majal, a three hour drive each way from Delhi.  That’s me at the right, standing in front of Agra’s Red Fort, which is pretty cool, and suffers from being in the Taj Majal’s shadow.

The poverty here is disturbing.  I thought I had seen poverty in Latin America, in Brazil and Mexico – it was nothing compared to India.  And the fact that the poor and the rich are living so close together is stunning.  I hear a lot about America losing the middle class – India’s extremes put that into perspective (although India has a growing middle class).

I have to get used to speaking here  – so far I’ve only spoken to art college students.  They usually stare blankly and intently, but they stir and murmur when I show cartoons about Pakistan, like the one below.

The cartoon below also makes the audiences murmur here. In India, is against the law to insult the sensibilities of someone of another religion, and I’m told that they would never see such a cartoon here (although, I should mention that whenever I crucify someone in a cartoon, I get some angry mail from Americans).  It is also taboo in India to draw the president, but cartoons about the Prime Minister are savage.

The taxi rides here are like thrill rides. The traffic lights and lines in the road are simply ignored.  We barrel head on into other cars every few seconds, only to swerve away at the last moment.  The drivers whisk past lazy cows, skinny dogs, rickshaws, throngs of pedestrians and rusty bicycles, at high speed, with only an inch or two of clearance.  I’ve read that India has the highest rate of traffic accidents – this must be true.

Here’s a little movie that I made on a rickshaw ride in Old Delhi today. I think the traffic here is charming.

I can’t stand the political conventions and I don’t understand why the media all goes along with presenting days long commercials for the candidates.  I’ve had enough if it – so it seemed like a good time to head off for India.  I’m doing a speaking tour of India through the US State Department speakers program.  I’ve never been to India before – they have lots of great cartoonists and a vibrant free press (with some interesting government restrictions).

Yesterday I spoke to a crowded room of about 300 students at the Sir JJ Academy of Applied arts in Mumbai.  Those are the students (right), they are a spirited bunch, sitting on the cold floor, Indian style, in the dizzying humidty to listen to me talk for a whopping two hours.  I wish I had thought to take a picture, just outside the door, of the mountain of  about 600 shoes.  They told me that, as the speaker, I need not take off my shoes – that’s good.  I can’t imagine how they can find their shoes after class.  I would have been there for an hour, sorting through shoes.  I need to remember to put name tags on everything.

Here I am (below) at Rudyard Kipling’s house, next door to the JJ Academy.   I’m told this is the “best art college in India” and the student’s work that I saw was quite impressive.  Thy asked good questions and seemed to have a good time.  I had a meeting with a bunch of newspaper editors for dinner.  This is a crazy huge, diverse country full of cartoon fans.  Such drama.