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 Enjoyable travel essay on India May 6, 2006
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
_Chasing the Monsoon_ by Alexander Frater was an enjoyable travel book, one that I read in just a few days. The author's intention, as one might guess from the title, was to follow the progress of the summer monsoon through India, beginning in the southernmost tip of the subcontinent, Cape Comorin, and following its progress up the west coast through Trivandrum, Calicut, Goa, and Bombay, then jetting over to Delhi, and then to experience the eastern arm of the monsoon (there are two arms, one in the east of India, one in the west) in Calcutta and in two places near Bangladesh, Shillong and Cherrapunji (there was a map illustrating his route).
Frater began the book discussing his childhood in the New Hebrides, a group of islands in the South Pacific jointly administered at one time by both France and the United Kingdom, how growing up his missionary father helped instill in him a fascination for weather. His father had talked about one of the rainiest spots on Earth, Cherrapunji, India, which was known at the height of the monsoon season in July to get as much as 75 feet of rain, though more often in the 30 to 40 foot range, receiving as much as 40 inches in one day. Though Frater's father never visited Cherrapunji and lost interest in meteorology due to mounting family financial problems and the Second World War, Alexander himself never completely lost interest in the weather.
After relating how he finally decided to follow the monsoon in the summer of 1987 and if possible visit Cherrapunji, he detailed his pilgrimage throughout India. Though Frater did discuss some of the science of the monsoon and in particular the history of its study (noting such famous researchers as H.F. Blandford, who beginning in 1875 became the first of a line of India-based climatologists who studied the monsoon and Sir John Eliot, his successor, often called the "father of monsoon studies"), the book is more a travel than a popular science book, detailing what Frater saw in India and in particular local reactions to the monsoon (or its unfortunate absence in drought-stricken parts of the country).
Throughout most of India, the onset of the monsoon rains, the "burst," was eagerly anticipated, the arrival of life-giving rains and cooler weather celebrated for centuries in art, poetry, and song. Frater visited remarkable pavilions, palaces, gardens, and fountains where the very wealthy had in the past had sought to recreated the cooling rains of the monsoon during times of heat and aridity.
Though many cities and regions have unofficial dates when the monsoon is supposed to begin - for instance around June 5 in Goa - the actual advance of the rains is unpredictable, subject to much discussion and even heated debate on the street, with many people hanging on every word of travelers to areas already experiencing monsoon rains, meteorologists, and even astrologers. I must say I was rather surprised that the monsoon traveled slowly enough through India that Frater for the most part was able to keep ahead of it, as while the first burst over Cape Comorin occurs generally around June 1, it is nearly July 1 before it reaches Delhi (if it reaches it at all; Frater chronicled how the monsoon rains had failed to arrive in recent years). Overall Frater did an excellent job of conveying the tense atmosphere of expectation among those waiting for the rains and the sense of relief and jubilation once they had arrived.
When the rains did arrive there was often great rejoicing with almost unofficial holidays in many parts of the country. Even in businesses that did not close had workers from cashiers and waiters up to expensively dressed businessmen and women running outside to cavort in the rain. Adults and children played in the rains, planned parties celebrating it, and even not unlike Frater himself planned trips to see it (the author wrote of oil-rich wealthy Middle Easterners flying on their private jets to India to witness such vast amounts of rain for themselves).
Additionally, people associated the monsoon with cures for a variety of ailments. The "monsoon cure," which could be anything from specific diets to being massaged in special oils to meditation with the onset of the rains, was big business, particularly in western India.
So important were the rains in providing a relief from the heat, watering crops, filling wells, and regenerating lakes and rivers, that much like with the monsoon cures an entire industry existed to ensure the arrival of the rains, ranging from ceremonial well diving to crackpot inventors to cloud-seeding with aircraft to singing ancient songs called ragas, composed especially to bring on the monsoonal rains.
Not everyone welcomed the monsoon. Frater detailed the great difficulties of officials in Calcutta in handling the floods brought about by the monsoon, and hinted at but didn't go into detail about the massive floods in Bangladesh the rains often brought. Fishermen and sailors often couldn't work in the high seas, cyclones, and driving rain during the height of the monsoon and pilots often had great difficulty flying in monsoon weather. Back when India was a British possession some Englishmen became depressed, alcoholic, or even committed suicide due to the rains.
A portion of the book detailed Frater's attempts to get permission from Delhi to visit Cherrapunji, as it was located in a region subject to anti-immigrant riots and fighting (something he might have gone a little bit more into). As foreign travel and even travel by Indians themselves to that area was tightly controlled, Frater had to navigate the intricate, complex, positively Byzantine corridors of Indian bureaucracy. This theme seems to be a common element of Indian travel writing, a topic addressed also in _An Area of Darkness_ by V.S. Naipaul and _The Search for the Pink-headed Duck_ by Rory Nugent.
Though I would have liked a bit more science and maybe some photos, overall I enjoyed the book.
 Braids the story lines into a seamless retelling March 10, 2006
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
In writing "Chasing the Monsoon: A Modern Pilgrimage through India" Alexander Frater weaves external observations his personal memories into a cohesive, entertaining account of his myriad experiences following the monsoon up and across the Indian subcontinent. Despite a plethora of details about the science and meteorology, accounts of his attempts to secure the blessings of a cumbersome Indian government's bureaucracy, his social interactions with people at all levels of Indian society, excruciating car trips, and recollections of his and his family's experiences living on islands in the Pacific, the book is neither dry nor dull.
Mr. Prater braids these various story lines into a seamless retelling of his experiences. His attention to detail-whether describing a worn-out hotel, recounting an overheard conversation about the virtues of various types of mangoes, or capturing the sensual experience of being engulfed by the monsoon-is quite remarkable. Though the story is highly personal, Mr. Frater does not impose himself upon the reader in such a manner as to detract from his travelogue. I'm glad he fully documented his experience and further appreciate his tidy way of bringing matters full circle.
chasing the monsoon December 18, 2005
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
The most improbable of all "journeys"..... to chase a monsoon through India. But how lyrical and memorable this trip is. This is a story not just of Frater, but of the people of India he comes in contact with during this voyage, and an explanation of how the monsoon affects each of them. This is one of the VERY few books I have ever read more than once. Another great read about a journey is South Wind by Norman Douglas.
 Depicting the subcontinent is no breeze! July 18, 2003
6 out of 6 found this review helpful
Few books on India can easily hope to undertake and accomplish the monumental task of depicting this complex society. This book is no exception. By taking the lens of the monsoon -- and the beliefs and practices which surround it in India - this book has adopted a wonderful device to depict a wide swathe of this country. Entertaining and thoughtful, this is certainly one of the more informative travelogues on India.
Just plain great December 20, 2002
2 out of 5 found this review helpful
Loved it, loved it, loved it. One of my all-time faves.
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