Offerings everywhere. In the airport bathroom a woman bows quickly to a potted rhododendron and a fresh bowl of marigolds. Incense and clove smoke hangs in the atmosphere along with the exhaust and hot garbage. I step on petals in the street, dodging tiny rafts of flowers and rice left for the dieties - little folded banana leaves clutching incense sticks destined to be ground underfoot and swept up with straw brooms and replaced by women and men carrying trays of them shrine-to-shrine.
They wear patterned sarongs and ride scooters one-handed balancing holy fare against the frenetic street. Every corner, ledge, vehicle - petals and scent. They stop and bow. Sprinkle with something like holy water from a bright painted vinegar jar. Move on to the next carved stones, motifs of stylized clouds point upward like clouds, like smoke. Small gates to heaven, daily trampled and refreshed with prayers, for synesthetic gods...
