that has 50 states instead of 16.
I've been here for 4 days and already my fears have been realized: I'm freaking confused.
Today I went for a drive in a car that, by American standards, was small, but it felt freaking huge next to the cars and cycles and scooters I drove in India. It was my first drive since almost going headlong into a huge ass bus on my last cycle ride from my host home to the SITA program, and the following things were strinkingly missing:
-Aggressive drivers (In the south, there's something called driver courtesy. In the south of India, there's something called "I need to get to where I'm going. Get out of my way." This quote is dependent, however, on the vehicle size).
-Speed Limit Signs: yes, there are speed limit signs in India, but does anyone ever look at them? Going 30 in a 25 zone seemed far too slow for a car of my size.
-Hand Gestures out the windows of cars or off the sides of autos/motorbikes/cycles saying "get out of my way" or "hey, I'm cutting you off, slow down" or "hi you're barreling straight toward me, I'm going left (cue hand gesture) and I'm gonna hope that you're gonna go right"
-NO BEEPING?!?!U()#_*@*!_)*(@$ (IT WAS FAR TOO QUIET TO BE ON A ROAD)
-No pedestrian obstacles: India has sidewalks, but they're more like guidelines really. As such, people end up jaywalking the crap out of the roads and making large bubbles of crowds that often stretches far into the street
-No random rallies that shuts down the entire block, regardless of whether convenient or not
-I was driving on the right side of the road, only allowed to take a right on red and having to glare at oncoming traffic for lefts. I almost drove on the left when there was no middle line, and a garbage truck beeped at me. He had it right, of course, but man it sure tells you a lot about how engrained your thinking is there.
-No divots in the road. And with the excess of shocks on American cars, I was really surprised at how not blistered my butt was by the time I got out of the car.
The list goes on, but I feel like you get the point.
In a word, it's too easy to drive here. I'm not saying I'm gonna start a police chase down the wrong side of the road on I-40 (huge highway near Chapel Hill), but man it would be really great if there was a little bit more chaos. It was awesome driving in India because you were focusing on it so much that you were totally engrossed in what you were doing: just living in the moment and using your driving and awareness skills to own the road ahead of you. So it was disappointing getting in my manual car (which, as I've told a lot of people, is a lot funner than automatic) and driving here for the first time.
In 5 days, I set off again for an excursion up the atlantic to see a bunch of friends I haven't seen in a while. One I haven't seen since my junior year of high school, but we have kept in touch since then. I'll end the adventure at Colby, where I'll be singing/learning music in a week for the a cappella show during senior week. I can't wait to get back to Colby.
I have a lot of dead space here in NC, and it's really getting to me/eating me away. I just had way too much to do/a lot to look forward to/a lot to experience in Madurai/India as a whole that I have found that the little things I have to do (aka, clean my room for an upcoming guest, book train tickets and activate my visa check card) really unmotivating and not very fun at all. Coelho would say that I should value the little things in my life, but on a grander scale, my life here is at a standstill until I go to visit Asheville in 3 days and take that Atlantic trip. Maybe I'll arrange some music just for fun, cause I haven't done that in a while.
I kind of expected this to happen actually, but I didn't think it would be this draining. My jetlag is almost through, but I'm still struggling when it comes to the later parts of the night (and if I get through those points, then I'm wired and awake, like I am now; note the 2:00 AM post time).
I used my cell phone for the first time today since I left, and it was freaking weird. But I hadn't forgotten how to T9-- that mechanism is permanently engrained in my memory. I texted like a madman and often didn't really know what to say to people when they responded. It was like I had just been handed the handbook on social skills and told to relearn everything I had learned before I went to India. I suppose that means I really engrained myself there, but that seems to be having some lovely repurcussions on my ability to transition back here.
YAY REVERSE CULTURE SHOCK!
Love and miss you Indian folk. I'll be back soon and I'll be sure to email you all individually when I stop being so incoherent!
Hasan
Sunday, May 3, 2009
Tuesday, April 28, 2009
Namaste: I leave in 27 hours
Yeah, I was pretty disturbed to calculate that number too.
I'm in between a lot of emotions, the foremost being anxiety. I'm about to transition out of the life I've lived for the last 4 months. I never thought I would say this, but thank god I'm leaving at 2:00 AM. I wouldn't be able to sleep if I had to leave the next day.
Anyways, I'm sad to be leaving again. The last time I left I have a pretty engrained snipet of crying over my mom's shoulder. I don't think I'll repeat the same scene, but it might be filled with similar emotions. I've met so many people here that I've come to love and experienced so much that to leave physically from the space is probably one of the more harder transitions I've had to do.
It's one of those things that I won't realize until I step onto or off the plane. That's how it always seems to happen with me-- I don't process until the aftermath.
Anyways, there isn't much to update that can't be written in at least 45 minutes, so I'll just say that my time alone was refreshing, incredible, and very rewarding. I had some of the most intense, personal, and incredible interactions of my life and had experiences that really, at times, blew my mind and conscience wide open. I was able to just be-- living and marveling at the things I saw and did at every single moment of my experience. It was really rejuvenating, similar to the feeling I had while going out and doing field research during my IS period, except this time I had little to guilt trip me.
I'll probably post another before I leave, but if I don't, I just wanted to say thanks to India and to all that it gave me regardless of the form (people, experiences, fun times, frustrating times, getting ripped off, you know, that sort of thing). I couldn't have done it without you.
Love and miss, and I"ll be back before you know it :-)
Hasan
I'm in between a lot of emotions, the foremost being anxiety. I'm about to transition out of the life I've lived for the last 4 months. I never thought I would say this, but thank god I'm leaving at 2:00 AM. I wouldn't be able to sleep if I had to leave the next day.
Anyways, I'm sad to be leaving again. The last time I left I have a pretty engrained snipet of crying over my mom's shoulder. I don't think I'll repeat the same scene, but it might be filled with similar emotions. I've met so many people here that I've come to love and experienced so much that to leave physically from the space is probably one of the more harder transitions I've had to do.
It's one of those things that I won't realize until I step onto or off the plane. That's how it always seems to happen with me-- I don't process until the aftermath.
Anyways, there isn't much to update that can't be written in at least 45 minutes, so I'll just say that my time alone was refreshing, incredible, and very rewarding. I had some of the most intense, personal, and incredible interactions of my life and had experiences that really, at times, blew my mind and conscience wide open. I was able to just be-- living and marveling at the things I saw and did at every single moment of my experience. It was really rejuvenating, similar to the feeling I had while going out and doing field research during my IS period, except this time I had little to guilt trip me.
I'll probably post another before I leave, but if I don't, I just wanted to say thanks to India and to all that it gave me regardless of the form (people, experiences, fun times, frustrating times, getting ripped off, you know, that sort of thing). I couldn't have done it without you.
Love and miss, and I"ll be back before you know it :-)
Hasan
Friday, April 17, 2009
India #10: Tomorrow
I leave Madurai, the place where I have lived for the last 3 months. As such, I've decided to make a list of what I would direly miss when I leave here in less than 24 hours.
The things I will miss most:
-That fucking auto driver, whoever he is, who would always run me into the curb on the way to school. (note: 'that fucking auto driver' applies to any crazy India driver who would cut me off
-Being that fucking cycle guy who would zoom past two wheelers or cut off people in order to squeeze through a one foot hole through a congested intersection.
-Racing school boys to Tamil class and/or a two wheeler with an agressive driver
-Pineapple slices everyday for lunch at a local fruit dealer
-Interacting with the internet cafe people (the one with bright orange cubicles and an insane amount of room)
-Hearing high pitched "HIIIIIIIII"s from random people, both kids and adults
-Saying vanakkam (greeting word which, if said the right way, sounds very vulgar in English) and getting a giggle and a "Tamil Teriyumahhh (He knows tamil?!)?!" in return
-Dr. Arun, my Tamil teacher, because of his great phrases, overall jubilance, and because, to put it bluntly, the man is a beast at Tamil.
-My host mother. The talks we had were incredible, and we managed to get really close to each other over the past three months. I have no idea what I would do if she wasn't my host mother. She also was an excellent cook, and her sassyness will never cease to entertain me.
-My host brother (age 13), for all his exclamations (example: ayooyooooooo *hits his face*), facial expressions, antics, fake wounds (he once tatooed a red cut by the side of his eye and convinced me, with acting involved, that he had just fallen down the stairs), hilarious phrases/one liners (Just a small sample: Why did the woman tiptoe past the medicine cabinet? So she wouldn't wake the sleeping pills. What clothes do ducks wear? Duxedoes.), and sarcasm.
-My host sister (age 8), for always being what a little 8 year old sister is: cute, hilarious, attention-seeking, always wanting a piggy back ride (regardless of the locale), smiley, laughing, jumpy, and energetic. If I was ever in a bad mood or annoyed, she would always cheer me up, regardless of what she did.
-My mother's digital camera. God rest it's soul.
-The cow that bumped me to the side when it wanted to walk where I was standing
-The gross amount of noise you confront whenever you're outside (whether it be automobile exhaust, beeping, random concert loudspeakers blaring traditional hindi/tamil music, or a political speech/rally)
-The gross amount of smells you confront whenever you're outside (including automobile exhaust, sewer smell, jasmine, tea, coffee, wet road/mud, dust, spices)
-The gross amount of color you see whenever you look around you
-Sketchy internet cafes, that almost always, under the history or pop out address bar, had at least five porn sites that had been visited within the last five hours (which made the seat you were sitting in just that more besmirched). WHen you know you are in a sketchy internet cafe: the letter 'U' and the right arrow key have been switched on the keyboard and your chair is warm.
-The immense amount of sweat (we're talking gallons) that evaporated off me because of physical exertion through 90+ degree fareinheit weather for the past four months.
-Random people trying to get me to come into their shop for free (what the hell does that even mean?)
-Meshach and Senthil, my two interpretors, because they gave me the most memorable experiences I've had since being here (one of them being my birthday).
-The SITA group. Though we didn't get along too well or make very close relationships, the friendly atmosphere was all that anyone needed to have a great time in a city like this
-All the people I talked to, regardless of the seriousness or absurdity of our discussion (this ranged from watermelons being equivalent to testicles--don't ask, I just smiled and nodded-- to why Obama is screwing over India)
-The guy who thought I could get him an appointment with the Guiness Book of World Records for having a 4-5 year old nephew that could name every country in the world in a minute and 49 seconds.
-Ashok Bhavan-- my favorite stop in lunch meal place (for, get this, 50 cents a meal)
-Random festivals or rallies in the middle of busy streets without warning or explanation
-The song that cars play when they back up (whenever a car is in reverse here, it plays the theme song of AirTel, an Indian telephone company. I'll sing it for you if you're really that curious when I get back).
-Biscuits/Milk Bikis
-Tea/Coffee/Lime Juice four times a day
-INDIAN FOOD (though right now I'm not so into it-- the whole group and a couple of Indians got food poisoning from the hotel we stayed at a few days ago in the mountain town of Kodaikanal-- it was a 4,400 rupee, like 100 dollors, a night place plus room and board, and yet they still served shitty food. I'm also taking some with me in the form of recipes)
-The Butt Gun (device that acts as toilet paper, except it uses water, and a lot of pressure)
-The fashion/clothes worn by everyone here
-The couple that ran the internet cafe across the street from the abroad center, despite the fact that the internet was about as fast as a 44 kb/sec dial-up connection.
-My cycle (bless it's soul. It was falling apart).
-Hampi.
-Pirated DVDs sold at 20 rupees, aka 40 cents, a movie
-Seeing people or talking with people that would make me realize how beautiful life really is, and how we should learn to cherish every single moment of our life, regardless of its banality or erraticness
-Coming back home at 7:30 pm, and calling it "late" (Madurai shuts down, like Chapel Hill, after 9:30 PM)
-Waking up at 6:30 AM each morning (hopefully this will continue, cause god it felt good)
-Voice lessons (so fun)
-Wearing a Veshti/Lungi (manskirt) and not have it be a cause for concern
-Not being on facebook (alas, I'm back on it)
-Being spoken to in rapid tamil and expected to respond easily/just as fast as he/she did
-Tamil TV (indescribably hilarious)
-Playing Cricket with the kids on my program and other host brothers, always with a crowd of 15 year old boys around either staring at us like we're lunatics or smiling and waving and using the three sentences of English they knew (and us responding with the three sentences of Tamil we knew; thankfully, the sentences we both knew often overlapped)
-Incense (which was in every closed space anywhere)
-The architecture/art in temples
-The mosquitoes that hovered in my room every night. Some could make the argument that they got very up in my grill (I actually stopped killing them before I went to bed each night, and I got used to them biting me. Now I only wake up with like four bites)
-The line of ants that used to go through my room to the kitchen (it disappeared because we moved, but soon came back in the new house)
-The moustaches (every guy over the age of 18 had a moustache. My translators was, by far, the most badass: it was a handlebar stache)
-Being able to throw trash/excess food on the ground and not have anyone say "pick that shit up"
-Indians and their waiting tactics (Some people make you wait with WHATEVER you try to do, just so they can do it)
I think that's all I've got for now, there may be a more extensive list when I'm about to leave on April 29th (my flight is technically on April 30th... at 2:00 AM IN THE MORNING. WTF LUFTHANSA)
Love and miss, and I'll be back soon!
Hasan
The things I will miss most:
-That fucking auto driver, whoever he is, who would always run me into the curb on the way to school. (note: 'that fucking auto driver' applies to any crazy India driver who would cut me off
-Being that fucking cycle guy who would zoom past two wheelers or cut off people in order to squeeze through a one foot hole through a congested intersection.
-Racing school boys to Tamil class and/or a two wheeler with an agressive driver
-Pineapple slices everyday for lunch at a local fruit dealer
-Interacting with the internet cafe people (the one with bright orange cubicles and an insane amount of room)
-Hearing high pitched "HIIIIIIIII"s from random people, both kids and adults
-Saying vanakkam (greeting word which, if said the right way, sounds very vulgar in English) and getting a giggle and a "Tamil Teriyumahhh (He knows tamil?!)?!" in return
-Dr. Arun, my Tamil teacher, because of his great phrases, overall jubilance, and because, to put it bluntly, the man is a beast at Tamil.
-My host mother. The talks we had were incredible, and we managed to get really close to each other over the past three months. I have no idea what I would do if she wasn't my host mother. She also was an excellent cook, and her sassyness will never cease to entertain me.
-My host brother (age 13), for all his exclamations (example: ayooyooooooo *hits his face*), facial expressions, antics, fake wounds (he once tatooed a red cut by the side of his eye and convinced me, with acting involved, that he had just fallen down the stairs), hilarious phrases/one liners (Just a small sample: Why did the woman tiptoe past the medicine cabinet? So she wouldn't wake the sleeping pills. What clothes do ducks wear? Duxedoes.), and sarcasm.
-My host sister (age 8), for always being what a little 8 year old sister is: cute, hilarious, attention-seeking, always wanting a piggy back ride (regardless of the locale), smiley, laughing, jumpy, and energetic. If I was ever in a bad mood or annoyed, she would always cheer me up, regardless of what she did.
-My mother's digital camera. God rest it's soul.
-The cow that bumped me to the side when it wanted to walk where I was standing
-The gross amount of noise you confront whenever you're outside (whether it be automobile exhaust, beeping, random concert loudspeakers blaring traditional hindi/tamil music, or a political speech/rally)
-The gross amount of smells you confront whenever you're outside (including automobile exhaust, sewer smell, jasmine, tea, coffee, wet road/mud, dust, spices)
-The gross amount of color you see whenever you look around you
-Sketchy internet cafes, that almost always, under the history or pop out address bar, had at least five porn sites that had been visited within the last five hours (which made the seat you were sitting in just that more besmirched). WHen you know you are in a sketchy internet cafe: the letter 'U' and the right arrow key have been switched on the keyboard and your chair is warm.
-The immense amount of sweat (we're talking gallons) that evaporated off me because of physical exertion through 90+ degree fareinheit weather for the past four months.
-Random people trying to get me to come into their shop for free (what the hell does that even mean?)
-Meshach and Senthil, my two interpretors, because they gave me the most memorable experiences I've had since being here (one of them being my birthday).
-The SITA group. Though we didn't get along too well or make very close relationships, the friendly atmosphere was all that anyone needed to have a great time in a city like this
-All the people I talked to, regardless of the seriousness or absurdity of our discussion (this ranged from watermelons being equivalent to testicles--don't ask, I just smiled and nodded-- to why Obama is screwing over India)
-The guy who thought I could get him an appointment with the Guiness Book of World Records for having a 4-5 year old nephew that could name every country in the world in a minute and 49 seconds.
-Ashok Bhavan-- my favorite stop in lunch meal place (for, get this, 50 cents a meal)
-Random festivals or rallies in the middle of busy streets without warning or explanation
-The song that cars play when they back up (whenever a car is in reverse here, it plays the theme song of AirTel, an Indian telephone company. I'll sing it for you if you're really that curious when I get back).
-Biscuits/Milk Bikis
-Tea/Coffee/Lime Juice four times a day
-INDIAN FOOD (though right now I'm not so into it-- the whole group and a couple of Indians got food poisoning from the hotel we stayed at a few days ago in the mountain town of Kodaikanal-- it was a 4,400 rupee, like 100 dollors, a night place plus room and board, and yet they still served shitty food. I'm also taking some with me in the form of recipes)
-The Butt Gun (device that acts as toilet paper, except it uses water, and a lot of pressure)
-The fashion/clothes worn by everyone here
-The couple that ran the internet cafe across the street from the abroad center, despite the fact that the internet was about as fast as a 44 kb/sec dial-up connection.
-My cycle (bless it's soul. It was falling apart).
-Hampi.
-Pirated DVDs sold at 20 rupees, aka 40 cents, a movie
-Seeing people or talking with people that would make me realize how beautiful life really is, and how we should learn to cherish every single moment of our life, regardless of its banality or erraticness
-Coming back home at 7:30 pm, and calling it "late" (Madurai shuts down, like Chapel Hill, after 9:30 PM)
-Waking up at 6:30 AM each morning (hopefully this will continue, cause god it felt good)
-Voice lessons (so fun)
-Wearing a Veshti/Lungi (manskirt) and not have it be a cause for concern
-Not being on facebook (alas, I'm back on it)
-Being spoken to in rapid tamil and expected to respond easily/just as fast as he/she did
-Tamil TV (indescribably hilarious)
-Playing Cricket with the kids on my program and other host brothers, always with a crowd of 15 year old boys around either staring at us like we're lunatics or smiling and waving and using the three sentences of English they knew (and us responding with the three sentences of Tamil we knew; thankfully, the sentences we both knew often overlapped)
-Incense (which was in every closed space anywhere)
-The architecture/art in temples
-The mosquitoes that hovered in my room every night. Some could make the argument that they got very up in my grill (I actually stopped killing them before I went to bed each night, and I got used to them biting me. Now I only wake up with like four bites)
-The line of ants that used to go through my room to the kitchen (it disappeared because we moved, but soon came back in the new house)
-The moustaches (every guy over the age of 18 had a moustache. My translators was, by far, the most badass: it was a handlebar stache)
-Being able to throw trash/excess food on the ground and not have anyone say "pick that shit up"
-Indians and their waiting tactics (Some people make you wait with WHATEVER you try to do, just so they can do it)
I think that's all I've got for now, there may be a more extensive list when I'm about to leave on April 29th (my flight is technically on April 30th... at 2:00 AM IN THE MORNING. WTF LUFTHANSA)
Love and miss, and I'll be back soon!
Hasan
Saturday, April 11, 2009
India #9: A Funny Thing Happened In Madurai Today...
It rained.
Why is this so funny? Why, when I woke up ready to go to Rameswaram with my family two days ago (to be told in this entry) did I laugh/find it ironic when I looked outside and lo, a thunderstorm was abrewing?
Four reasons:
A) it is the dry season here in Tamil Nadu. I have not seen water falling from the sky since it was in the form of crystallized whiteness that ordinarily greets me on my way to Anthro class at Colby. So, I laughed in joy-- because god, did it feel good to have rain fall on my face again.
B) My host brother woke up that morning, took a look outside, and lay there shocked for 2 minutes. Those whole two minutes, I was against the wall in a very Kevin Baier-like manner (specifically after he just poached the shit out of me in a game of die) laughing my ass off. His face was epic. I won't even attempt to try and describe it.
C) As part of my IS report, I have been talking about erratic rain conditions that farmers have gone through over the past 10 years. I had just finished my paper the day before, and so, when rain came booming through the heavens, I could only think of how incredible it was to rely on it for water. I began to think about how these farmers looked up at the clouds and asked "why" on a daily basis, because the dry season left them to rely on ground water, which is quickly being eaten away. And so, I looked at the rain, and I remembered my IS project, and I asked myself how these farmers will react to such a rain in a season that is termed "dry" for an obvious reason. I'll find out next week when I go visit some of them to say goodbye and thanks again before I leave for North India and, likely, will never see them again. I can only hope that I left a good enough impression in their minds; because a lot of their stories and experiences are engrained in my consciousness, as was clear when I saw the rain, and thought of them.
D) It happened a day after I was invited to one of my informants' villages to celebrate a festival with him (story to come-- pics tomorrow?). As part of the festival, they ask for a good harvest and plenty of rain for the crops. For them, it was a show of faith in nature. To me, it was an array of color; something to be photographed and told about later (which I will do here). Now I'm not saying that this festival had anything to do with the rains straight after, but it did certainly make the point that you can't just discount parts of a culture as colorful and something I should remember. It's a part of their life, and they believe in this festival and practice it for a reason. THe fact that the rains came so quickly after this festival may have been a simple twist of fate, but it was quite amazing that this happened regardless. The potential that the weather had to do with the festival can't be the sole reason behind the rains, but it was very invigorating and inspiring to see it pay off. The people that participated in the festival were dancing, and full of spirit, and didn't care about the fact that it was currently 97 degrees outside (the sun was behind the clouds). They were bathed in sweat and dancing around like the world didn't matter. I can't put words into their mouths, but to experience this was beautiful. There was no other word for it. To be surrounded by drum beats, dancing villagers, half of which balanced plants on top of their head, rambonxious kids shouting the name of a politician that had made their lives much better within the last 5 years, adults losing themselves in the practice... was beautiful. That festival revealed a people with a deep desire to live, and they lived it through spirit. And so, the rains came, and I thought of this festival, and contemplated on how real it was, and how real the after affects were...
That rain felt good to touch and smell again... but man did it fall-- hopefully not to the point where the farmers' crops get destroyed: right now they're growing dry crops, and if the fields get too waterlogged, they'll die, and the soil will erode, and it'll just be a bad situation. I can only hope for them to not have to rely on the government to pay them back for the damage caused by nature, a value that would only amount to 1/2 of what they had invested on the lands. I'll update that as soon as I visit some of these people.
And now, my update. I'm not going to update my life from last tour, because frankly, it would take far too long. Suffice it to say that the pics of Pondicherry I have on the site are enough to tell that story.
The IS period was incredible. I've never felt so alive in my life. I can't describe to you how incredible it was to go into someone else's home and talk to them about their life. THere was a spirit in their words that I couldn't describe. Whenever I ask questions to people, I usually have to wait for the answer... but I would ask a question through my translator, and they would just talk. They wouldn't stop. They wanted me to know about every single detail. One person, once I sat down in the chair and turned on my recorded, just started to talk to me; I hadn't said one word except "vannakam (greeting word)" and shook my head in a half yes half no motion (it's the Indian way to greet someone politely for the first time). I got to touch their lives through conversation, and what was so amazing about it was that they wanted me to, even though they had only met me five seconds before I uttered a word. They saw me, and they just wanted to talk. I would get back to the SITA center with 3 hours of solid interview, much of which was not at all useful to my research, but I didn't care. The stories and experiences they told me about surrounding their lives were just so real and so incredible. It wasn't that they were incredible or epic tales of struggle or even great stories to tell at parties; it was the way in which they told it to me, or how my translator translated them. It was the way in which they were so blunt, so real, so there. I can't describe it, but regardless of what information I would get from an interview, whether it be useful to my research or not, I would always come away from an interaction with these farmers and feel full of life and full of happiness. It was such a thrill to delve that close into someones life after just barely being a part of it.
What was my IS project about? well I won't write the 45 page paper that it ended up being (why it turned from a 15-35 page report to 45 pages, I have no idea, but the director said, if it makes sense, then go for it, so I did) here, or even try and recount it, because it was too complicated, but I was essentially studying how farmers around Madurai, to a large extent, have been left behind in the development model that India is using right now. Over the last 10 years, the agricultural economy has been very unprofitable for farmers due to erratic rain/water conditions (in the form of long droughts or huge torrential rain storms), overinvestment in the green revolution technologies, and a vacillating Indian market for agriculture. These factors have forced farmers to often invest, say, 10,000 rupees in their land over a three month period (the time it takes for a farmer to harvest his crops) and receive only 5,000 rupees from the crops he produced. They lose money each harvest, and are thus forced to either sell their land. Because of the money losses, they also have to borrow money, and, while the gov't gives a lot of subsidies to try and help out their money management, farmers still must deal with debt on a daily basis. "Damn my generation to hell" said one of the farmers. They have lost faith in their occupation, and in order to deal with this, they have begun to sell their land to invest in their kids education so that their children won't have to deal with this unprofitable field. The education will integrate the children into a development system that will provide them with regular wage jobs, such as a software engineer, or a teacher, or something else.
But, what is interesting about this whole situation, is that NO ONE is pointing to development as the problem. The development model that India is now running on is based on Western models of capitalism, a system that barely, if at all, helps out the lower classes. Instead, (and you'll have to trust me on this, or read my 45 pages of evidence, your choice) the development model has left people to BUY INTO IT if they have enough money, and has left out the population that most development economists have claimed to create their policies around: the poor. It favors those that can afford to get an education or integrate into this system... and farmers, trying to deal with their money issues, have only been able to do so by sacrificing themselves and their money security for their children. So, I argue, that development is leaving out what should be its chief beneficiary: the rural poor... if you want to hear more about it, I'll tell the details in person, cause I really don't want to rewrite it (beleive it or not, 45 pages double spaced is quite exhausting. Yeah, I wouldn't have thought so either).
IS was great, and it will be the part of India I remember the most. The people I met, the things I saw, and the lives I fell into filled me with such a rush of excitement: I was discovering life at the ground level, and not through a method that I have been chiefly taught at Colby: through distant sources, namely, books and scholarly journals. I don't want to sound like an elitist prick in saying this... because books are great and journals certainly have an important place in our lives (despite the fact that reading them are sometimes, in a word, a bitch) but it was just so great to get behind all the authors and understand how accounts are made... Definitely a different type of learning that I will cherish forever...
At the same time, I feel really guilty about IS. I went out and interviewed a group of people who were struggling in their society, and all for my report that would, ultimately, go nowhere. It would go to two places: A) to the SITA library of reports where other future students may use it as a template for their own research (which I doubt, cause who would read 45 pages when they could read one that was only 25) and B) to my record as a Colby student, ultimately for MY future. I used their experience for me, and I really can't get past that, cause in the long run, we're all trying to find happiness, so why should I get the credit and leave them chillin in their fields still struggling through their money problems? I dunno, I had a great time, but ultimately, I feel guilty invading these people's lives and having nothing to give back to them... and maybe, yeah, my presence as a Westerner as their guest gives them satisfaction (here to serve a guest is a great source of enjoyment and happiness), but I can't help but think that I'm leaving them with the short end of the stick.
Anyway, I have more to report, but I won't because this is far too long already, and I am quite loquacious (see comment about 45 page paper with 15 page min. required). I still have my birthday to retell, my 2 day trip with my host fam, and other IS excursions, but I can do that at a later date.
For now, I'm incredibly happy. I'm finally in India without ANY responsibilities, meaning I can just live and let live (which has, recently, become my motto). I hope you all are doing great, and I will see many of you in the near future!
Love and missage,
Has (Kerrigan/Jimmy!)
Why is this so funny? Why, when I woke up ready to go to Rameswaram with my family two days ago (to be told in this entry) did I laugh/find it ironic when I looked outside and lo, a thunderstorm was abrewing?
Four reasons:
A) it is the dry season here in Tamil Nadu. I have not seen water falling from the sky since it was in the form of crystallized whiteness that ordinarily greets me on my way to Anthro class at Colby. So, I laughed in joy-- because god, did it feel good to have rain fall on my face again.
B) My host brother woke up that morning, took a look outside, and lay there shocked for 2 minutes. Those whole two minutes, I was against the wall in a very Kevin Baier-like manner (specifically after he just poached the shit out of me in a game of die) laughing my ass off. His face was epic. I won't even attempt to try and describe it.
C) As part of my IS report, I have been talking about erratic rain conditions that farmers have gone through over the past 10 years. I had just finished my paper the day before, and so, when rain came booming through the heavens, I could only think of how incredible it was to rely on it for water. I began to think about how these farmers looked up at the clouds and asked "why" on a daily basis, because the dry season left them to rely on ground water, which is quickly being eaten away. And so, I looked at the rain, and I remembered my IS project, and I asked myself how these farmers will react to such a rain in a season that is termed "dry" for an obvious reason. I'll find out next week when I go visit some of them to say goodbye and thanks again before I leave for North India and, likely, will never see them again. I can only hope that I left a good enough impression in their minds; because a lot of their stories and experiences are engrained in my consciousness, as was clear when I saw the rain, and thought of them.
D) It happened a day after I was invited to one of my informants' villages to celebrate a festival with him (story to come-- pics tomorrow?). As part of the festival, they ask for a good harvest and plenty of rain for the crops. For them, it was a show of faith in nature. To me, it was an array of color; something to be photographed and told about later (which I will do here). Now I'm not saying that this festival had anything to do with the rains straight after, but it did certainly make the point that you can't just discount parts of a culture as colorful and something I should remember. It's a part of their life, and they believe in this festival and practice it for a reason. THe fact that the rains came so quickly after this festival may have been a simple twist of fate, but it was quite amazing that this happened regardless. The potential that the weather had to do with the festival can't be the sole reason behind the rains, but it was very invigorating and inspiring to see it pay off. The people that participated in the festival were dancing, and full of spirit, and didn't care about the fact that it was currently 97 degrees outside (the sun was behind the clouds). They were bathed in sweat and dancing around like the world didn't matter. I can't put words into their mouths, but to experience this was beautiful. There was no other word for it. To be surrounded by drum beats, dancing villagers, half of which balanced plants on top of their head, rambonxious kids shouting the name of a politician that had made their lives much better within the last 5 years, adults losing themselves in the practice... was beautiful. That festival revealed a people with a deep desire to live, and they lived it through spirit. And so, the rains came, and I thought of this festival, and contemplated on how real it was, and how real the after affects were...
That rain felt good to touch and smell again... but man did it fall-- hopefully not to the point where the farmers' crops get destroyed: right now they're growing dry crops, and if the fields get too waterlogged, they'll die, and the soil will erode, and it'll just be a bad situation. I can only hope for them to not have to rely on the government to pay them back for the damage caused by nature, a value that would only amount to 1/2 of what they had invested on the lands. I'll update that as soon as I visit some of these people.
And now, my update. I'm not going to update my life from last tour, because frankly, it would take far too long. Suffice it to say that the pics of Pondicherry I have on the site are enough to tell that story.
The IS period was incredible. I've never felt so alive in my life. I can't describe to you how incredible it was to go into someone else's home and talk to them about their life. THere was a spirit in their words that I couldn't describe. Whenever I ask questions to people, I usually have to wait for the answer... but I would ask a question through my translator, and they would just talk. They wouldn't stop. They wanted me to know about every single detail. One person, once I sat down in the chair and turned on my recorded, just started to talk to me; I hadn't said one word except "vannakam (greeting word)" and shook my head in a half yes half no motion (it's the Indian way to greet someone politely for the first time). I got to touch their lives through conversation, and what was so amazing about it was that they wanted me to, even though they had only met me five seconds before I uttered a word. They saw me, and they just wanted to talk. I would get back to the SITA center with 3 hours of solid interview, much of which was not at all useful to my research, but I didn't care. The stories and experiences they told me about surrounding their lives were just so real and so incredible. It wasn't that they were incredible or epic tales of struggle or even great stories to tell at parties; it was the way in which they told it to me, or how my translator translated them. It was the way in which they were so blunt, so real, so there. I can't describe it, but regardless of what information I would get from an interview, whether it be useful to my research or not, I would always come away from an interaction with these farmers and feel full of life and full of happiness. It was such a thrill to delve that close into someones life after just barely being a part of it.
What was my IS project about? well I won't write the 45 page paper that it ended up being (why it turned from a 15-35 page report to 45 pages, I have no idea, but the director said, if it makes sense, then go for it, so I did) here, or even try and recount it, because it was too complicated, but I was essentially studying how farmers around Madurai, to a large extent, have been left behind in the development model that India is using right now. Over the last 10 years, the agricultural economy has been very unprofitable for farmers due to erratic rain/water conditions (in the form of long droughts or huge torrential rain storms), overinvestment in the green revolution technologies, and a vacillating Indian market for agriculture. These factors have forced farmers to often invest, say, 10,000 rupees in their land over a three month period (the time it takes for a farmer to harvest his crops) and receive only 5,000 rupees from the crops he produced. They lose money each harvest, and are thus forced to either sell their land. Because of the money losses, they also have to borrow money, and, while the gov't gives a lot of subsidies to try and help out their money management, farmers still must deal with debt on a daily basis. "Damn my generation to hell" said one of the farmers. They have lost faith in their occupation, and in order to deal with this, they have begun to sell their land to invest in their kids education so that their children won't have to deal with this unprofitable field. The education will integrate the children into a development system that will provide them with regular wage jobs, such as a software engineer, or a teacher, or something else.
But, what is interesting about this whole situation, is that NO ONE is pointing to development as the problem. The development model that India is now running on is based on Western models of capitalism, a system that barely, if at all, helps out the lower classes. Instead, (and you'll have to trust me on this, or read my 45 pages of evidence, your choice) the development model has left people to BUY INTO IT if they have enough money, and has left out the population that most development economists have claimed to create their policies around: the poor. It favors those that can afford to get an education or integrate into this system... and farmers, trying to deal with their money issues, have only been able to do so by sacrificing themselves and their money security for their children. So, I argue, that development is leaving out what should be its chief beneficiary: the rural poor... if you want to hear more about it, I'll tell the details in person, cause I really don't want to rewrite it (beleive it or not, 45 pages double spaced is quite exhausting. Yeah, I wouldn't have thought so either).
IS was great, and it will be the part of India I remember the most. The people I met, the things I saw, and the lives I fell into filled me with such a rush of excitement: I was discovering life at the ground level, and not through a method that I have been chiefly taught at Colby: through distant sources, namely, books and scholarly journals. I don't want to sound like an elitist prick in saying this... because books are great and journals certainly have an important place in our lives (despite the fact that reading them are sometimes, in a word, a bitch) but it was just so great to get behind all the authors and understand how accounts are made... Definitely a different type of learning that I will cherish forever...
At the same time, I feel really guilty about IS. I went out and interviewed a group of people who were struggling in their society, and all for my report that would, ultimately, go nowhere. It would go to two places: A) to the SITA library of reports where other future students may use it as a template for their own research (which I doubt, cause who would read 45 pages when they could read one that was only 25) and B) to my record as a Colby student, ultimately for MY future. I used their experience for me, and I really can't get past that, cause in the long run, we're all trying to find happiness, so why should I get the credit and leave them chillin in their fields still struggling through their money problems? I dunno, I had a great time, but ultimately, I feel guilty invading these people's lives and having nothing to give back to them... and maybe, yeah, my presence as a Westerner as their guest gives them satisfaction (here to serve a guest is a great source of enjoyment and happiness), but I can't help but think that I'm leaving them with the short end of the stick.
Anyway, I have more to report, but I won't because this is far too long already, and I am quite loquacious (see comment about 45 page paper with 15 page min. required). I still have my birthday to retell, my 2 day trip with my host fam, and other IS excursions, but I can do that at a later date.
For now, I'm incredibly happy. I'm finally in India without ANY responsibilities, meaning I can just live and let live (which has, recently, become my motto). I hope you all are doing great, and I will see many of you in the near future!
Love and missage,
Has (Kerrigan/Jimmy!)
Friday, April 3, 2009
Nothing new to update
For those that actually follow this thing:
I'm probably not going to update for at least another few weeks because I've got a lot of IS things to do before I can be free to be in India without constraint of something I "need" to do. IS was fun, but I have a lot of frustrations with my project, one of them being that this project just will go absolutely nowhere, except to help my "future anthro skills" and gain me a letter grade and possibly even 4 credits at Colby.
I feel guilty for researching a group of poor people who are currently being gipped out of development because it is primarily a western model, and not an Indian model. The consumerist model doesn't work here. India is too complex to be fit into a model and told that "everything will be ok in 30 years, the first few will suck for this group of people and benefit this group of people", but ultimately, all it is doing is keeping some people in the same place, and in some cases, making this place less and less secure with each passing day. As a result, farmers in general have invested in their kids' education, and said "to hell with farming." One of the people I interviewed even said the following: "Damn my generation to hell" in English. I was surprised. How can you DAMN a group of people for the sake of a country? Aren't they a part of it?
More surprisingly, this group of people, farmers, and primary producers in general, make up 70% of the Indian population.
Whose development is this anyways?
Update coming soon.
Hasan
I'm probably not going to update for at least another few weeks because I've got a lot of IS things to do before I can be free to be in India without constraint of something I "need" to do. IS was fun, but I have a lot of frustrations with my project, one of them being that this project just will go absolutely nowhere, except to help my "future anthro skills" and gain me a letter grade and possibly even 4 credits at Colby.
I feel guilty for researching a group of poor people who are currently being gipped out of development because it is primarily a western model, and not an Indian model. The consumerist model doesn't work here. India is too complex to be fit into a model and told that "everything will be ok in 30 years, the first few will suck for this group of people and benefit this group of people", but ultimately, all it is doing is keeping some people in the same place, and in some cases, making this place less and less secure with each passing day. As a result, farmers in general have invested in their kids' education, and said "to hell with farming." One of the people I interviewed even said the following: "Damn my generation to hell" in English. I was surprised. How can you DAMN a group of people for the sake of a country? Aren't they a part of it?
More surprisingly, this group of people, farmers, and primary producers in general, make up 70% of the Indian population.
Whose development is this anyways?
Update coming soon.
Hasan
Thursday, March 19, 2009
Unexpected Communication
Hey everyone
I have not yet gotten my blog up to date, making this post seem a little counterproductive, but I felt like I should share one of the more special experiences that I've had since I arrived in India that justh appened to me literally an hour ago. I'm sure this type of thing has happened during other abroad experience over the last 20 (almost 21 *yikes*) years of my life, but only noticed how incredible it was for the first time today. If any of you have read Paolo Coelho, this is a similar situation to one of his short stories that I read the other day (which is why it was really ironic that this happened; maybe the universe is sending me a sign).
It was 12:00 pm; the Indian sun was at its apex, but luckily it hadn't reached the hottest part of the day yet. I was with my interpreter Senthil on his two wheeler motorbike, running errands for my Independent Study project on land purchases due to rapid urbanization and its effects on farmers' livelihoods. We had just come from visiting a nearby school that had been built on land bought from a farmer that I had talked to the day before. As we took the turn out of the school, I noticed the back wheel of our motorbike was dragging a little too much, and so did Senthil. He muttered the Tamil curse word "chit" (that can mean, great, damn it, fuck, shit, depending on your vocabulary) and said that we needed to find the nearest tire valla (tire vendor). Finding a tire valla, however, was to be a little harder than initially thought-- we were currently 20 kms from the outskirts of Madurai; all we saw were a few tea stalls and a group of men repairing and repainting three massive dump trucks to be used for some type of life job in the future. My interpreter stopped near the men with the dump trucks, told them in Tamil what the problem was, and the men wagged their head back and forth (the S. Indian version of a nod), pointed in the direction of the nearest tire vendor, and Senthil ran off to find a tire seller.
So there I sat with five Indian men dressed in lungis (a large cloth used as a type of manskirt-- decorated with ornate designs-- usually this cloth denotes that these men are of the working class) for the next 30 minutes or so in the shade of a giant tamarind tree. One of the men approached me and asked me what I was doing here. I told him I was a student in America studying in Madurai for the semester. He nodded and then asked me how I liked India. I said that I loved it; especially the food. He laughed. I asked him what he did for a living. He told me he drove trucks and got them ready to drive, which is what he and the others were doing now. He asked my age. I'm 20 I said. I'm 23 he said. We smiled at each other, a similar generational happiness, at our conversation. Two kids normally separated by half a world meeting for the first time.
Then I realized something I hadn't really noticed while I was talking to him: he had been speaking Tamil the whole time, and I had been responding in English, and yet we had little to no difficulty understanding what we were saying. The miracle of human communication had connected two people that couldn't be more different of background: I found out later that he had lived in a village his whole life; on the other hand, I had been to India twice in my life, and had been moving around ever since I can remember (rarely staying in one city or town for more than a year). It was then that I realized how special we all are, and how easy it is to understand if we honestly tried to do so. When we share our lives, we want people to listen; we just need a person with adjustable ears: one that can understand and listen with perfect clarity at all experiential sound wave levels. If we wanted to truly understand our needs, experiences, grievences, and knowledge, we could do so if we had the urge to hear the other talk without bound about his/her life. How simple conflicts would be if the egoism of our own interests would never block our ears!
My friends and family pride themselves on calling me a space cadet that can zone out with just a moment's notice, and totally miss what people say or tell me. From now on, I'm gonna seek to change that. I've heard from people that you gain the best friends in life if you are able to listen as well as you talk. Since I don't have the talking thing down very well (as most people know, I'm an awkward talker, especially after being in Madurai and losing about half of my working english vocabulary due to under-exposure), I think I'm gonna try and use my ears to communicate more often.
Hasan
I have not yet gotten my blog up to date, making this post seem a little counterproductive, but I felt like I should share one of the more special experiences that I've had since I arrived in India that justh appened to me literally an hour ago. I'm sure this type of thing has happened during other abroad experience over the last 20 (almost 21 *yikes*) years of my life, but only noticed how incredible it was for the first time today. If any of you have read Paolo Coelho, this is a similar situation to one of his short stories that I read the other day (which is why it was really ironic that this happened; maybe the universe is sending me a sign).
It was 12:00 pm; the Indian sun was at its apex, but luckily it hadn't reached the hottest part of the day yet. I was with my interpreter Senthil on his two wheeler motorbike, running errands for my Independent Study project on land purchases due to rapid urbanization and its effects on farmers' livelihoods. We had just come from visiting a nearby school that had been built on land bought from a farmer that I had talked to the day before. As we took the turn out of the school, I noticed the back wheel of our motorbike was dragging a little too much, and so did Senthil. He muttered the Tamil curse word "chit" (that can mean, great, damn it, fuck, shit, depending on your vocabulary) and said that we needed to find the nearest tire valla (tire vendor). Finding a tire valla, however, was to be a little harder than initially thought-- we were currently 20 kms from the outskirts of Madurai; all we saw were a few tea stalls and a group of men repairing and repainting three massive dump trucks to be used for some type of life job in the future. My interpreter stopped near the men with the dump trucks, told them in Tamil what the problem was, and the men wagged their head back and forth (the S. Indian version of a nod), pointed in the direction of the nearest tire vendor, and Senthil ran off to find a tire seller.
So there I sat with five Indian men dressed in lungis (a large cloth used as a type of manskirt-- decorated with ornate designs-- usually this cloth denotes that these men are of the working class) for the next 30 minutes or so in the shade of a giant tamarind tree. One of the men approached me and asked me what I was doing here. I told him I was a student in America studying in Madurai for the semester. He nodded and then asked me how I liked India. I said that I loved it; especially the food. He laughed. I asked him what he did for a living. He told me he drove trucks and got them ready to drive, which is what he and the others were doing now. He asked my age. I'm 20 I said. I'm 23 he said. We smiled at each other, a similar generational happiness, at our conversation. Two kids normally separated by half a world meeting for the first time.
Then I realized something I hadn't really noticed while I was talking to him: he had been speaking Tamil the whole time, and I had been responding in English, and yet we had little to no difficulty understanding what we were saying. The miracle of human communication had connected two people that couldn't be more different of background: I found out later that he had lived in a village his whole life; on the other hand, I had been to India twice in my life, and had been moving around ever since I can remember (rarely staying in one city or town for more than a year). It was then that I realized how special we all are, and how easy it is to understand if we honestly tried to do so. When we share our lives, we want people to listen; we just need a person with adjustable ears: one that can understand and listen with perfect clarity at all experiential sound wave levels. If we wanted to truly understand our needs, experiences, grievences, and knowledge, we could do so if we had the urge to hear the other talk without bound about his/her life. How simple conflicts would be if the egoism of our own interests would never block our ears!
My friends and family pride themselves on calling me a space cadet that can zone out with just a moment's notice, and totally miss what people say or tell me. From now on, I'm gonna seek to change that. I've heard from people that you gain the best friends in life if you are able to listen as well as you talk. Since I don't have the talking thing down very well (as most people know, I'm an awkward talker, especially after being in Madurai and losing about half of my working english vocabulary due to under-exposure), I think I'm gonna try and use my ears to communicate more often.
Hasan
Tuesday, March 17, 2009
India #7: A Brief Tour Finish
I should probably be finishing up my interview questions that I have in two hours with the father of my translator who happened to fit exactly into my "sample interviewees" (details of my Independent Study project hopefully at the bottom).
One thing I did forget to mention in my last update: my boat ride (the first of many) in the Periyar Wildlife Preserve. It was a small boat, covered by a metal roof, all decked out in the a darkish green (or was it orange...). Anyway, there was a huge watering hole in the reserve where many animals went to, you know, water themselves. It was about 3 hours long, and within those three hours, we saw a large family of boars, sambar deers (I did ask if these animals were involved in the production of a South Indian gravy sambar... Sadly no), elephants, water buffaloes, and storks either drinking or bathing themselves in water/dirt to keep cool in the 100 degree weather. I got some great pics of these animals. Sadly I have yet to post them...
Quick What/where/when/etc.
What: 2nd "educational" tour
Where: Kerela
Who: Me, and 15 other rowdy Americans
Why: *insert my new mantra* why NOT?
How: Van, House Boat, Ferries, Autos, Massive Buses with huge names on the top of them (to be explained), and my own two feet.
First stop: 8:00 AM in Kottayam:
Kottayam, as I said before, is essentially a big bulk of people pushed into a city-like setting. It had a very Madurai-like feel, but a very Bangalore-like population: not many people were decked out in their Sunday Saris (or salwars for that matter). Anyways, we left Kottayam at 8:00 AM on our way to a small suburb nearby where we would board one of the most epic boats I've ever seen. After an hour of rim rattling van, we found ourselves barging (no pun intended) onto what looked to be a mix between an enormous one story Gondola (picture Italian gondola and then enlarge the image about 20 times and you get this boat) and a thatched longhouse seen in American Indian "recreated reservations" in New England. I have pics of this, but they are not really... accessible, like almost all of my other pics (if you haven't noticed, there's a trend). The boat had the following amenities: two bedrooms, two bathrooms, a kitchen (with a TV?! and a GEORGE FORMAN STOVE?!), a large "lounge area" that overlooked the front of the boat, and a kitchen where 3 Indians sat preparing coffee, coconuts, tea, and fried bananas (sailors of the high seas of Kerela's backwaters). We spent around 4 hours on this boat, puttering slowly from the river we started on, across a pretty large lake, and into another random river. All the while, palm, coconut and banana trees lined the sides of the lake, giving it a more Florida feel, minus the immense amount of noise from drivers and beach clubs. It was really relaxing: I read 70 pages of the Lemon Tree, put it down cause I got frustrated at the P-I situation (again), then went on the front deck to sit in the scalding 90 degree weather (by now it feels like a nice 70 to me. To emphasize, the other day it was cloudy, and the weather was extremely cool-- I thought it was around 60 degrees. What weather.com told me, however, made me realize how brainwashed my body's weather complex had become: it was 85.21 degrees fareinheit. I laughed. For three straight minutes. The upcoming Maine winter is going to OWN me). It was relaxing, and all the while I said hello to locals passing on boats, small gondolas, or farming on the side of the lake.
After the boat ride, we arrived in a town around 2 hours outside of Cochin, our eventual destination. We once again filed into the van, and hit the most straight roads (each of our stomachs said a mini thank god) I've seen since visiting Ohio on my College tour junior year. We arrived in Cochin at around 5 pm, after passing what seemed to be at least five pizza huts (and a subway?!). Cochin is a very interesting place. It is set about 3/4 of the way down the Western coast of India, and takes up an enormous amount of room. Contrary to popular belief, the city got more and more spread out as you approached the sea. The more inland you got, the more like Manhattan it got. The more towards the sea, the more fishing colonies, deceivingly beautiful beaches, and quaint little communities emerged. We pulled into the hotel, me and a couple of guys went to scan the area (and to look for an extra memory card for my camera), checked out the prices at Pizza Hut (and found a Domino's int he process), and returned to the hotel. That night we ate the most inedible meal I have experienced since my mom tried so valiantly to convince me that eggplant was a great invention in 7th grade. The worst part: it costed 180 rupees. The even WORSE part: my stomach hated the concept of this hotel's meal, and straightway gave me one of the worst bouts of stomach pains/gas/diarhea/burps/throw up sensations/nausea I've ever experience at the same time. What a knock out combo. Needless to say, I ordered Domino's and a bottle of Kingfisher (local beer, well relatively local-- it's made in Bangalore) the next night.
The next day we woke up and took, take a guess, a boat tour of Cochin. We first stopped at Fort Cochin to see the oldest church in Kerela, built by the Portuguese right after Da Gama's historic journey from Portugal, around Cape Town in S. Africa, and to straight on to Cochin. Da Gama was buried in the church back then, and his tomb rests in the church. It wasn't heavily decorated, though the caretakers said it was still used by the locals for prayers.
We got back onto the boat and then went to the best part of our tour in Kerela (for me anyway). Get ready to laugh. We stepped off the boat, and the first sign I saw said the following:
One thing I did forget to mention in my last update: my boat ride (the first of many) in the Periyar Wildlife Preserve. It was a small boat, covered by a metal roof, all decked out in the a darkish green (or was it orange...). Anyway, there was a huge watering hole in the reserve where many animals went to, you know, water themselves. It was about 3 hours long, and within those three hours, we saw a large family of boars, sambar deers (I did ask if these animals were involved in the production of a South Indian gravy sambar... Sadly no), elephants, water buffaloes, and storks either drinking or bathing themselves in water/dirt to keep cool in the 100 degree weather. I got some great pics of these animals. Sadly I have yet to post them...
Quick What/where/when/etc.
What: 2nd "educational" tour
Where: Kerela
Who: Me, and 15 other rowdy Americans
Why: *insert my new mantra* why NOT?
How: Van, House Boat, Ferries, Autos, Massive Buses with huge names on the top of them (to be explained), and my own two feet.
First stop: 8:00 AM in Kottayam:
Kottayam, as I said before, is essentially a big bulk of people pushed into a city-like setting. It had a very Madurai-like feel, but a very Bangalore-like population: not many people were decked out in their Sunday Saris (or salwars for that matter). Anyways, we left Kottayam at 8:00 AM on our way to a small suburb nearby where we would board one of the most epic boats I've ever seen. After an hour of rim rattling van, we found ourselves barging (no pun intended) onto what looked to be a mix between an enormous one story Gondola (picture Italian gondola and then enlarge the image about 20 times and you get this boat) and a thatched longhouse seen in American Indian "recreated reservations" in New England. I have pics of this, but they are not really... accessible, like almost all of my other pics (if you haven't noticed, there's a trend). The boat had the following amenities: two bedrooms, two bathrooms, a kitchen (with a TV?! and a GEORGE FORMAN STOVE?!), a large "lounge area" that overlooked the front of the boat, and a kitchen where 3 Indians sat preparing coffee, coconuts, tea, and fried bananas (sailors of the high seas of Kerela's backwaters). We spent around 4 hours on this boat, puttering slowly from the river we started on, across a pretty large lake, and into another random river. All the while, palm, coconut and banana trees lined the sides of the lake, giving it a more Florida feel, minus the immense amount of noise from drivers and beach clubs. It was really relaxing: I read 70 pages of the Lemon Tree, put it down cause I got frustrated at the P-I situation (again), then went on the front deck to sit in the scalding 90 degree weather (by now it feels like a nice 70 to me. To emphasize, the other day it was cloudy, and the weather was extremely cool-- I thought it was around 60 degrees. What weather.com told me, however, made me realize how brainwashed my body's weather complex had become: it was 85.21 degrees fareinheit. I laughed. For three straight minutes. The upcoming Maine winter is going to OWN me). It was relaxing, and all the while I said hello to locals passing on boats, small gondolas, or farming on the side of the lake.
After the boat ride, we arrived in a town around 2 hours outside of Cochin, our eventual destination. We once again filed into the van, and hit the most straight roads (each of our stomachs said a mini thank god) I've seen since visiting Ohio on my College tour junior year. We arrived in Cochin at around 5 pm, after passing what seemed to be at least five pizza huts (and a subway?!). Cochin is a very interesting place. It is set about 3/4 of the way down the Western coast of India, and takes up an enormous amount of room. Contrary to popular belief, the city got more and more spread out as you approached the sea. The more inland you got, the more like Manhattan it got. The more towards the sea, the more fishing colonies, deceivingly beautiful beaches, and quaint little communities emerged. We pulled into the hotel, me and a couple of guys went to scan the area (and to look for an extra memory card for my camera), checked out the prices at Pizza Hut (and found a Domino's int he process), and returned to the hotel. That night we ate the most inedible meal I have experienced since my mom tried so valiantly to convince me that eggplant was a great invention in 7th grade. The worst part: it costed 180 rupees. The even WORSE part: my stomach hated the concept of this hotel's meal, and straightway gave me one of the worst bouts of stomach pains/gas/diarhea/burps/throw up sensations/nausea I've ever experience at the same time. What a knock out combo. Needless to say, I ordered Domino's and a bottle of Kingfisher (local beer, well relatively local-- it's made in Bangalore) the next night.
The next day we woke up and took, take a guess, a boat tour of Cochin. We first stopped at Fort Cochin to see the oldest church in Kerela, built by the Portuguese right after Da Gama's historic journey from Portugal, around Cape Town in S. Africa, and to straight on to Cochin. Da Gama was buried in the church back then, and his tomb rests in the church. It wasn't heavily decorated, though the caretakers said it was still used by the locals for prayers.
We got back onto the boat and then went to the best part of our tour in Kerela (for me anyway). Get ready to laugh. We stepped off the boat, and the first sign I saw said the following:
JEW TOWN
Seeing such a blatant name implying Jews were here was quite humorous-- it was like naming the Bronx The Hasid Quarter. Directly under it says "Ethnic Passage", which I thought to be a little bizarre, given that Jews are not an ethnicity... (I also saw a "Jew Town" sign perched directly on top of a "God's own Country" sign... irony?). Cochin, remarks a sign outside of the old sephardi synagogue there, houses currently around 95 Jews total, yet only 10 family practice on a daily basis. News to me. Jew Town was pretty awesome. There were Hebrew words perched all over the place, and the town was set up as a huge circle of cobble-stone roads lined by handicraft, textile, and souvenir shops (and a memory card stall, at which I still didn't freaking find a memory card. Stay tuned for my camera solution). At the end of one of the roads stood the sephardi synagogue, dating back around 400 years as well. I wasn't able to take a picture of the synagogue, because the caretakers disowned anyone who did. Yet they still took 10 rupees from all visitors (sigh... Jews and their rules). For those with a background in Synagogue architecture, picture a sephardi style synagogue (podium in the middle) facing steps that led up to a golden ark. Around the podium were literally no chairs-- benches lined the walls surrounding the podium, but the caretaker said that everyone worshipping there sat on the floor to pray. He also said that there were only 10 practicing families still here, and that men primarily led the service, though they have started teaching women and children (post-b-mitzvah of course) the services so the men "don't get too bogged down" in work (sounded like they were quasi-orthodox). I saw a sign saying "Haval Al Azman", and it brought me back to the days I spent in Israel on a bus when our Hebrew teacher Racheli would have us do this progression: (How do you say good?! Tov!, after Tov? Tov Meod, Tov Meod, Metzuyan, Metzuyan, Haval Al Azman!)... It was a good time. I almost bought a hippie shirt, but instead bought the book that changed my life: The Zahir by Paolo Coelho. Everyone go out and buy it. After reading it, you will never have a bad day. Ever.
Post-Jew town, we went to a nearby cafe. Ate great food, drank real iced tea, and only costed us 100 rupees. What a great meal.
Afterward we went to the waterfront, read for a time, then went back to a cultural arts exhibition. There we saw traditional Kerela fighting/martial arts, traditional dancing, and ACTING THROUGH DANCE (which was INCREDIBLE. This style of dance incorporated traditional dance with facial expressions that would blow your mind. The actor uses all parts of his face to portray his feelings: he scrunches up and down the neck, moves the eye brows up and down at a rapid pace, has different eye movements/shapes for each feeling, and on top of that, uses his body to fill up the stage. It truly was remarkable. I can't explain it well, but I tried to do it after I saw it. I ended up on the floor, with three Indian kids and 15 Americans laughing at me. Sigh, guess my future in theater was never meant to be).
We went back to the hotel, ordered pizza and beer, as I said before, and watched Anoop become the 13th on American Idol. Nothing special.
Next day: gondola tour down a side water outside of Cochin. We took mini house boats (this time, about the size of a real Gondola) with men gondolaing behind us with huge bamboo sticks. I tried steering the boat. It was freaking hard. Saw some nice views like the rest of our boat tours, and then headed back.
Some of us went back to the same cafe we had gone to the day before, this time eating potato soup, chicken salad, and chips instead of carrot soup, grilled cheese, and sprout salad. There was no difference: it was still delicious.
Then, an epic journey. We crossed from Fort Cochin to nearby Vesper Island for a mere 2 rupees on a ferry, took the bus 26 kilometers to "Cherai" and walked to the beach. For those of you who have been fortunate enough to have visited beaches in North or South Carolina (not the Myrtle Beach ones, like the ones out of the way like Sunset Island), this beach was EXACTLY like that, only loaded with a bunch of Indian men that did backflips and cartwheels into waves. It was incredible. We got there at about 4 pm, when the sun was low enough such that it was around 80 degrees (or a comfy 60 degrees for all of those back in Maine, who wish it would stop snowing). The sand squeeked beneath your feet; the water was warm to the touch (but really salty for ocean water); the light was a bright orange for our time there. This was the refreshing beauty I was talking about. It rekindled that light in the back of our heads that is reborn when we see beauty, in any form, in the world around us. On top of it, I experienced my first sunset over the ocean. When it had become too dark to see the ocean, we took two autos the 26 miles back to the ferry and then went all the way back to the hotel, each of us feeling more refreshed than even Hampi. As I said before, Kerela was refreshing. Hampi still remains my favorite place in the world (directly beside the Israeli Desert).
We then took a night train all the way back to Madurai. I was able to get a whole 8 hours of sleep, despite the presence of five snorers in my car (must have been the ocean). Tour ended, and the IS period began, and here I am. I have much more to update, such as my IS project, why it hasn't worked yet, and above all, Pondicherry (which was very very anticlimactic... though I think it's cause I only saw one side of the city the whole three days I was there), but I really must do those interview questions. I meet the interpreter in an hour to go over them and go over my expectations (cause he is a first timer, and about as nervous as I am) for the interview, despite the fact that I'm interviewing his father (story of why I'm doing that will probably come tomorrow when I'm back from my interpreter's village). To all Colbians: hang in there, the snow will melt and so will your work... figuratively. To everyone else: until next time.
Love and Miss you all, and I STILL wish every one of you were here with me.
Hasan Bhatti, "The Most Likely to Make a map of Madurai before I leave for the US" (surprisingly I got the award for "directional ability"... didn't expect that one)
Post-Jew town, we went to a nearby cafe. Ate great food, drank real iced tea, and only costed us 100 rupees. What a great meal.
Afterward we went to the waterfront, read for a time, then went back to a cultural arts exhibition. There we saw traditional Kerela fighting/martial arts, traditional dancing, and ACTING THROUGH DANCE (which was INCREDIBLE. This style of dance incorporated traditional dance with facial expressions that would blow your mind. The actor uses all parts of his face to portray his feelings: he scrunches up and down the neck, moves the eye brows up and down at a rapid pace, has different eye movements/shapes for each feeling, and on top of that, uses his body to fill up the stage. It truly was remarkable. I can't explain it well, but I tried to do it after I saw it. I ended up on the floor, with three Indian kids and 15 Americans laughing at me. Sigh, guess my future in theater was never meant to be).
We went back to the hotel, ordered pizza and beer, as I said before, and watched Anoop become the 13th on American Idol. Nothing special.
Next day: gondola tour down a side water outside of Cochin. We took mini house boats (this time, about the size of a real Gondola) with men gondolaing behind us with huge bamboo sticks. I tried steering the boat. It was freaking hard. Saw some nice views like the rest of our boat tours, and then headed back.
Some of us went back to the same cafe we had gone to the day before, this time eating potato soup, chicken salad, and chips instead of carrot soup, grilled cheese, and sprout salad. There was no difference: it was still delicious.
Then, an epic journey. We crossed from Fort Cochin to nearby Vesper Island for a mere 2 rupees on a ferry, took the bus 26 kilometers to "Cherai" and walked to the beach. For those of you who have been fortunate enough to have visited beaches in North or South Carolina (not the Myrtle Beach ones, like the ones out of the way like Sunset Island), this beach was EXACTLY like that, only loaded with a bunch of Indian men that did backflips and cartwheels into waves. It was incredible. We got there at about 4 pm, when the sun was low enough such that it was around 80 degrees (or a comfy 60 degrees for all of those back in Maine, who wish it would stop snowing). The sand squeeked beneath your feet; the water was warm to the touch (but really salty for ocean water); the light was a bright orange for our time there. This was the refreshing beauty I was talking about. It rekindled that light in the back of our heads that is reborn when we see beauty, in any form, in the world around us. On top of it, I experienced my first sunset over the ocean. When it had become too dark to see the ocean, we took two autos the 26 miles back to the ferry and then went all the way back to the hotel, each of us feeling more refreshed than even Hampi. As I said before, Kerela was refreshing. Hampi still remains my favorite place in the world (directly beside the Israeli Desert).
We then took a night train all the way back to Madurai. I was able to get a whole 8 hours of sleep, despite the presence of five snorers in my car (must have been the ocean). Tour ended, and the IS period began, and here I am. I have much more to update, such as my IS project, why it hasn't worked yet, and above all, Pondicherry (which was very very anticlimactic... though I think it's cause I only saw one side of the city the whole three days I was there), but I really must do those interview questions. I meet the interpreter in an hour to go over them and go over my expectations (cause he is a first timer, and about as nervous as I am) for the interview, despite the fact that I'm interviewing his father (story of why I'm doing that will probably come tomorrow when I'm back from my interpreter's village). To all Colbians: hang in there, the snow will melt and so will your work... figuratively. To everyone else: until next time.
Love and Miss you all, and I STILL wish every one of you were here with me.
Hasan Bhatti, "The Most Likely to Make a map of Madurai before I leave for the US" (surprisingly I got the award for "directional ability"... didn't expect that one)
Monday, March 9, 2009
India #6 (for real): Finals and 1/2 of Kerela
Hello everyone,
A lot has happened since I last wrote. I meant to get to an update before I left, but unfortunately I didn't do that well planning time for it... I guess I'll start with finals week and try to get to today, but we'll see how that goes.
I think I'll outline my week before tour (finals week) to get in the "spirit" of the week (which was characterized by me doing an obscene amount of homework within an incredibly small amount of time-- 4 essays and one test in a five day period):
I. Coffee Addiction Update
II. Hasan Bhatti, contact for The Guinness book of World Records?!
III. Shifting Houses
IV. The Miracle of the Butt Gun (yes, I do mean two t's)
As you all well know, I'm currently fighting my addiction to coffee. So far, it is not going so well. My host mother has gotten in the habit of giving me coffee in the morning, and my tongue has gotten used to the warm milk drink with a sliver of caffeine that I find it hard to ask for anything else when I wake up. The good news: I no longer drink coffee when I get back from SITA. The bad news: I usually still have two "tea times" at SITA... during both of which my hands grow a mind of their own, and the next thing I know, I'm sitting there with an empty mug with coffee dregs at the bottom. That's probably a bit of an exaggeration, but it has become habit to get coffee at these tea times. In all, I'm failing at laying off the caffeine.
Me? A Guinness book of world records contact? who knew? Well, let me tell you how I "earned" that title. It was Saturday, and I still had to finish my final paper for Environmental Issues. The SITA building had just closed for the day, and I was walking into my internet cafe of choice to finish it on a word document (there are three of them really close to SITA. The one that I like has very very nice people who talk to you and introduce you to family friends. The connection isn't great, and the other two are much faster, but I like the atmosphere, so I keep going back). As I walk in, I say hi to the two attendants, a married couple (arranged of course), who normally make small talk with me as I'm checking facebook or updating my fantasy basketball league (which I'm still getting pwned in). This time, I find an older gentleman with a huge manila folder filled with papers and documents talking to the woman. The woman introduces him as her uncle (which is another way of saying a good friend... that happens a lot here). I say "vannakam," (what you say when you first meet someone) bowing my head to show respect, and he does the same. Then, he tells me to sit down and that he has something to tell me. I figures, why not-- I have 8 hrs to write 3 pages of my EI paper. So I sit down. Well, I had no idea what I was getting into-- what I thought would be a friendly chat about why I was here or finding out what he does around Madurai turned out to be the most amusing generalization about Americans that I had heard while being here. As soon as I sat down, he started to explain that his nephew, a boy of 4 years old, was a special human being. I asked why. He told me that a year ago, March 10, 2008, his nephew of 4 years had, with a huge map of the world in front of him, named every single country in the world in a mere minute and forty nine seconds (which is incredible by any standard). How was this possible, I asked. Apparently the kid had an exceptional photographic memory, where he could jsut look at a map or a document and then memorize everything on it, much like Danny the Hasid in The Chosen. He then opened the folder he was carrying, and began to show me countless documents that confirmed this feat: Tamil newspaper articles, notary signatures of those that had experienced the feat, a dvd of his nephew doing the deed, editorials praising the Indian educational system, his nephew's report card at the best high school in Madurai (the report card had straight 100s in every single category). The evidence was beyond what it needed to be: I believed him, and I would be surprised if no one else did. As I continued to marvel at this accomplishment, I was still wondering why he was telling me all this-- so I asked him. This was his response: well you're American, and I've been trying to contact the Guinness book of world records for the past year; maybe you could send in a good word for me and my nephew... Well that was a little shocking. Apparently, in his mind, the fact that I was wearing a Manny Ramirez Red Sox shirt, had a modern looking REI backpack, and a water bottle holder (three things that obviously set me apart as an American) meant that I was best friends with the entire Guinness "judging staff". I told him that I had read the book, but had no clue how to do this-- I was just as in the dark as he was. He was a little disappointed but didn't let up. He then asked me to circulate this story to my friends within SITA, as if this accomplishment would somehow be more visible to Guinness if a bunch of Americans were astonished and impressed at such a feat. I felt sorry for the guy, but the whole scene was just too hard to not laugh: Me sitting there with a very shocked, resigned, impressed, and altogether incredulous face, and him sitting there almost begging me to give him my "infinite" wisdom of the world of entering a world record. I told him I would do my best (email them, look on the website... you know, things that I could actually do), but I wouldn't promise him anything... and that was that. He said thank you for listening and that he'd probably be back at a later date and that he hoped I could get in touch with them.
So, let's add yet another definition to the image of Americans in their minds in addition to the following (not a complete list; I just can't remember them all): We all know and love Obama! (which people shout to me once they know I'm from America-- one time I was riding in my cycle with a bunch of other SITA kids and an auto driver going the opposite direction leaned out the side of the rickshaw and yelled in a very long, drawn out, almost mockingly dramatic manner: OOOOOBBBAAAAAMAAAAAAA!!!! Priceless), that we want to buy postcards when we wont buy the weird things that street vendors sell on the streets (such as a "mint one of a kind mini chess board for only 100 rupees..." yeah right), that we can be ripped off easily, and that we all know the process of entering the Guinness book of world records.
The same day, Saturday, I experience a pretty large change in my home situation, literally. Apparently, the house that I had lived in for the last few months had been a "rented house" to stay in while the family's real house was being built only 100 meters away (the new house was in the same compound and was essentially the same exact house in a different location). That Saturday, the house was ready, and my family moved everything into that house. So when I got back to my "old" house after finishing my EI paper, my room was an empty rectangle, save the tornado of papers and books that I sloshed around while I was doing my finals. Somewhere in the confusion of moving all my stuff, I lost my purple flashlight (I know mom... I'm sad too)... oh well. Our new house is very similar to the old one architecturally-- except this time, I was blessed by the gods above by one of the best devices in the world.
The Butt Gun. Yes, it is exactly what it sounds like: a gun for the butt. Before I had told you guys about the process of going to the bathroom, and how Indian sewer systems were not equipped to process toilet paper (and that you had to use water to clean your... ahem, business). Ordinarily you just use a small cup of water, your left hand (sometimes referred to as your "poo hand" by SITA students), and a ton of soap. Not so with the butt gun. For those that wash dishes, picture the "sprayer" that was typically found next to faucets during childhood (I haven't seen them recently-- essentially they are like a hose attachment with a little lever in the back to release the water). That's what the butt gun is, except it spurts the water out with much more force (and for good reason). If you put two and two together, you'll understand why I'm pretty excited about this piece of machinery-- cause I'm not gonna go that deep into detail (mainly because some of you are munching on buff chick calzones currently). Suffice it to say that it is quite a refreshing experience.
K, now to tour. We went to the neighboring state of Kerela, described as the "most beautiful state in India." I still maintain Hampi as the most beautiful place I know in India, but they certainly were telling the truth; Kerela was very very beautiful. To me, the two places represent two different types of beauty that our earth possesses. Hampi's beauty slaps you in the face; it is a lot more explicitly different, and therefore the beauty is a lot more surprising and yet rejuvenating-- it's a totally different world that not many people have ever experienced before, and as such it is much more of a surprising and astonishing type of beauty. Kerela's is a bit different. I would characterize Kerela as a whole as more of a refreshing beauty; more like "oh god, there are still places like you left in the world." Kerela contained both familiar types of beauty and unprecedented ones as well: rolling mountains of greenery (and tropical plants), a long and beautiful coastline, horizons upon horizons of lush green agriculture (including huge tea plantations upon the mountains in S. India-- pics to come don't worry). Kerela was a nice respite from massive amounts of work to the IS period.
We set off the Sunday after my Guinness fiasco in vans due west for the town of Thekkedy (located right along the boundary between the two most southern states in India: Tamil Nadu, where Madurai is, and Kerela). On the way to Thekkedy, we took the winding roads up the Western Ghats, my new favorite mountain range. Our van driver was a little nuts, going a little too fast around the bends, that made most of us pretty sick by the time we got off. Thankfully we stopped in a small town to have tea time to recenter ourselves (at which I, yet again, got coffee... I really am not doing too good with this whole anti-caffeine campaign). We reached Thekkedy, and straightway went to a spice plantation. Thekkedy is well known for three things: tea production, spice production, and the Periyar Tiger Wildlife Preserve (all of which we visited). We got a mini tour of the spice plantation, got to ride an elephant (which was definitely as cool as I imagined, although it wasn't as scary as I remember it was when I was 8... I can't remember where we were, but I do remember taking an elephant up a pretty large hill with a cliff on one side and a solid rock wall on the other side... for those that haven't been on an elephant it swings side to side while you're on top, so half the time I was either thinking we would eat it down the mountain or get stuck on the rock wall... good times), and met a family of farmers who were drying coffee beans on large mats outside of their hut. There were two really really cute girls, one about 3 and one 5, that followed us around. I said hi to them and managed to snap a pic of them. Hopefully I'll get my act together and get them up at some point... that's a big if tho.
After the spice garden and our elephant ride, a group of us went to dinner at a nearby hotel (hotels here almost always have a restaurant associated with them). Bad idea. Three problems: A) too hot inside, B) the food blew, and C) no dessert. Epic fail. But it did spark a good ending: we got some ice cream downtown, the best I've had since Maple View Farms outside of Carrboro (usually the ice cream here tastes like whipped cream but has the consistency of butter... this time it was different, thankfully). When we got back from our delightful dessert, we experienced something peculiar back at the hotel. We were walking up the stairs when a hotel attendant with a smoking metal cylinder (yes think Christian priest going down the aisle with that smoking cylinder during a mass) filled with incense flailed the metal object around our halls. Quite a way to freshen up a hotel hallway, but man did it smell good (like jasmine flowers dipped in honey... mmmmm)
The next day, we arose at 6:00 AM to take a 3 hour "safari walk" in the Periyar Wildlife Preserve. It was a very nice day-- a comfortable 75 degrees-- and very bright. It was such a nice walk; the sun on your shoulders and the morning mist spraying your face. I often closed my eyes and listened to the sounds of everything going on around me. Such a nice difference from the hustle and bustle of Madurai.I have some pics of this setting as well; it was very beautiful and captured a lot of the sights that I often saw during my time in Kerela-- when I get them up I'll tell you guys so you can see what I mean. We saw lots of monkeys, some bison, a few elephants, and a ton of rare birds. No tiger (sadly), but we did see a tree that had been scratched up by one (that counts right?). An interesting thing about this ecotourist site: all the guides that worked there once were tiger poachers just 10 years before (and have contributed to the tiger's endangered state in India as a whole). Good planning on the preserve's part.
After the reserve, we were let loose on the town for the day. The town of Thekkedy was nothing special. It was just as tourist oriented as Hampi town was, with tons of stores devoted to silk outfits and small handicrafts that you could find almost everywhere (but that shop owners insisted were indigenous to Thekkedy only... that seems to be a common sales tactic in India). I had a good time just browsing the shops, talking to random Indians as I passed, and exploring the town with other SITA members. At night, we went to a very good restaurant to make up for the shittyness that was the night before.
The next day we went to a tea plantation in the morning, where most environmentalists would cringe. On our way there, the hills were absolutely covered in tea plants-- or large bushes about 3 feet tall. It was all very green and pretty, but any environmentalist would look at that situation and say: god that run off must be ridiculous. And they would be right. There were huge gulleys down the sides of these tea plants where rain from the wet season (From Sept to Dec) had torn the land straight apart. I have pics of this also. All in due time.
We got back to the hotel, and then left for Kottayam, a layover city for our journey to Cochin. This is the journey in which I fell in love with the Ghats. The views I saw on that bus ride were like none I've ever seen in the Whites or the Blue Ridges (for all you out west, spare your Sierra Nevada and Rocky nationalism. I'll get out there eventually). I was only able to take a few pictures cause my memory card (which only held 49 pics at the time) was running out of room, and I was on the side of the bus that was most often facing the mountain side, and not the huge valleys and peaks of other mountains in the distance (I got a new camera, thankfully, so this won't be a problem in the future-- this time I didn't get lost). I wish I could describe the views or show you epic pictures, but alas, it was not destined to be so. Stay tuned for the Himalayas!!!!
I think I'm gonna stop here. It's a nice mid-point, and I've been writing for about 2 hrs now... maybe I should really take a class in shortening my details and my points, cause honestly sometimes its just plain exhausting. Anyway, I'll update you on my current status. Right now I'm in the middle of my Independent Study period, during which I need to get a shitload of interviews and literature material to eventually form a 25 page paper about the effect of land purchases by multinational corporations and other groups interested in land ownership on farmers outside of Madurai (yep, that means I'll be spending most my time inside of a village!!!! SO EXCITED-- stay tuned for pics. They're gonna be sweet, guaranteed). This wont be hard and I know it-- I am really interested in the topic and I know that when I start, I won't be able to stop... it's just starting it all that is the problem...
Until tomorrow (when I'll write the rest of tour and update my current status). Love and miss you all, and I wish you were here to experience this country with me-- it's one of those countries that truly changes your life in ways that you can't even imagine. Keep being beautiful people :-)
Hasan
A lot has happened since I last wrote. I meant to get to an update before I left, but unfortunately I didn't do that well planning time for it... I guess I'll start with finals week and try to get to today, but we'll see how that goes.
I think I'll outline my week before tour (finals week) to get in the "spirit" of the week (which was characterized by me doing an obscene amount of homework within an incredibly small amount of time-- 4 essays and one test in a five day period):
I. Coffee Addiction Update
II. Hasan Bhatti, contact for The Guinness book of World Records?!
III. Shifting Houses
IV. The Miracle of the Butt Gun (yes, I do mean two t's)
As you all well know, I'm currently fighting my addiction to coffee. So far, it is not going so well. My host mother has gotten in the habit of giving me coffee in the morning, and my tongue has gotten used to the warm milk drink with a sliver of caffeine that I find it hard to ask for anything else when I wake up. The good news: I no longer drink coffee when I get back from SITA. The bad news: I usually still have two "tea times" at SITA... during both of which my hands grow a mind of their own, and the next thing I know, I'm sitting there with an empty mug with coffee dregs at the bottom. That's probably a bit of an exaggeration, but it has become habit to get coffee at these tea times. In all, I'm failing at laying off the caffeine.
Me? A Guinness book of world records contact? who knew? Well, let me tell you how I "earned" that title. It was Saturday, and I still had to finish my final paper for Environmental Issues. The SITA building had just closed for the day, and I was walking into my internet cafe of choice to finish it on a word document (there are three of them really close to SITA. The one that I like has very very nice people who talk to you and introduce you to family friends. The connection isn't great, and the other two are much faster, but I like the atmosphere, so I keep going back). As I walk in, I say hi to the two attendants, a married couple (arranged of course), who normally make small talk with me as I'm checking facebook or updating my fantasy basketball league (which I'm still getting pwned in). This time, I find an older gentleman with a huge manila folder filled with papers and documents talking to the woman. The woman introduces him as her uncle (which is another way of saying a good friend... that happens a lot here). I say "vannakam," (what you say when you first meet someone) bowing my head to show respect, and he does the same. Then, he tells me to sit down and that he has something to tell me. I figures, why not-- I have 8 hrs to write 3 pages of my EI paper. So I sit down. Well, I had no idea what I was getting into-- what I thought would be a friendly chat about why I was here or finding out what he does around Madurai turned out to be the most amusing generalization about Americans that I had heard while being here. As soon as I sat down, he started to explain that his nephew, a boy of 4 years old, was a special human being. I asked why. He told me that a year ago, March 10, 2008, his nephew of 4 years had, with a huge map of the world in front of him, named every single country in the world in a mere minute and forty nine seconds (which is incredible by any standard). How was this possible, I asked. Apparently the kid had an exceptional photographic memory, where he could jsut look at a map or a document and then memorize everything on it, much like Danny the Hasid in The Chosen. He then opened the folder he was carrying, and began to show me countless documents that confirmed this feat: Tamil newspaper articles, notary signatures of those that had experienced the feat, a dvd of his nephew doing the deed, editorials praising the Indian educational system, his nephew's report card at the best high school in Madurai (the report card had straight 100s in every single category). The evidence was beyond what it needed to be: I believed him, and I would be surprised if no one else did. As I continued to marvel at this accomplishment, I was still wondering why he was telling me all this-- so I asked him. This was his response: well you're American, and I've been trying to contact the Guinness book of world records for the past year; maybe you could send in a good word for me and my nephew... Well that was a little shocking. Apparently, in his mind, the fact that I was wearing a Manny Ramirez Red Sox shirt, had a modern looking REI backpack, and a water bottle holder (three things that obviously set me apart as an American) meant that I was best friends with the entire Guinness "judging staff". I told him that I had read the book, but had no clue how to do this-- I was just as in the dark as he was. He was a little disappointed but didn't let up. He then asked me to circulate this story to my friends within SITA, as if this accomplishment would somehow be more visible to Guinness if a bunch of Americans were astonished and impressed at such a feat. I felt sorry for the guy, but the whole scene was just too hard to not laugh: Me sitting there with a very shocked, resigned, impressed, and altogether incredulous face, and him sitting there almost begging me to give him my "infinite" wisdom of the world of entering a world record. I told him I would do my best (email them, look on the website... you know, things that I could actually do), but I wouldn't promise him anything... and that was that. He said thank you for listening and that he'd probably be back at a later date and that he hoped I could get in touch with them.
So, let's add yet another definition to the image of Americans in their minds in addition to the following (not a complete list; I just can't remember them all): We all know and love Obama! (which people shout to me once they know I'm from America-- one time I was riding in my cycle with a bunch of other SITA kids and an auto driver going the opposite direction leaned out the side of the rickshaw and yelled in a very long, drawn out, almost mockingly dramatic manner: OOOOOBBBAAAAAMAAAAAAA!!!! Priceless), that we want to buy postcards when we wont buy the weird things that street vendors sell on the streets (such as a "mint one of a kind mini chess board for only 100 rupees..." yeah right), that we can be ripped off easily, and that we all know the process of entering the Guinness book of world records.
The same day, Saturday, I experience a pretty large change in my home situation, literally. Apparently, the house that I had lived in for the last few months had been a "rented house" to stay in while the family's real house was being built only 100 meters away (the new house was in the same compound and was essentially the same exact house in a different location). That Saturday, the house was ready, and my family moved everything into that house. So when I got back to my "old" house after finishing my EI paper, my room was an empty rectangle, save the tornado of papers and books that I sloshed around while I was doing my finals. Somewhere in the confusion of moving all my stuff, I lost my purple flashlight (I know mom... I'm sad too)... oh well. Our new house is very similar to the old one architecturally-- except this time, I was blessed by the gods above by one of the best devices in the world.
The Butt Gun. Yes, it is exactly what it sounds like: a gun for the butt. Before I had told you guys about the process of going to the bathroom, and how Indian sewer systems were not equipped to process toilet paper (and that you had to use water to clean your... ahem, business). Ordinarily you just use a small cup of water, your left hand (sometimes referred to as your "poo hand" by SITA students), and a ton of soap. Not so with the butt gun. For those that wash dishes, picture the "sprayer" that was typically found next to faucets during childhood (I haven't seen them recently-- essentially they are like a hose attachment with a little lever in the back to release the water). That's what the butt gun is, except it spurts the water out with much more force (and for good reason). If you put two and two together, you'll understand why I'm pretty excited about this piece of machinery-- cause I'm not gonna go that deep into detail (mainly because some of you are munching on buff chick calzones currently). Suffice it to say that it is quite a refreshing experience.
K, now to tour. We went to the neighboring state of Kerela, described as the "most beautiful state in India." I still maintain Hampi as the most beautiful place I know in India, but they certainly were telling the truth; Kerela was very very beautiful. To me, the two places represent two different types of beauty that our earth possesses. Hampi's beauty slaps you in the face; it is a lot more explicitly different, and therefore the beauty is a lot more surprising and yet rejuvenating-- it's a totally different world that not many people have ever experienced before, and as such it is much more of a surprising and astonishing type of beauty. Kerela's is a bit different. I would characterize Kerela as a whole as more of a refreshing beauty; more like "oh god, there are still places like you left in the world." Kerela contained both familiar types of beauty and unprecedented ones as well: rolling mountains of greenery (and tropical plants), a long and beautiful coastline, horizons upon horizons of lush green agriculture (including huge tea plantations upon the mountains in S. India-- pics to come don't worry). Kerela was a nice respite from massive amounts of work to the IS period.
We set off the Sunday after my Guinness fiasco in vans due west for the town of Thekkedy (located right along the boundary between the two most southern states in India: Tamil Nadu, where Madurai is, and Kerela). On the way to Thekkedy, we took the winding roads up the Western Ghats, my new favorite mountain range. Our van driver was a little nuts, going a little too fast around the bends, that made most of us pretty sick by the time we got off. Thankfully we stopped in a small town to have tea time to recenter ourselves (at which I, yet again, got coffee... I really am not doing too good with this whole anti-caffeine campaign). We reached Thekkedy, and straightway went to a spice plantation. Thekkedy is well known for three things: tea production, spice production, and the Periyar Tiger Wildlife Preserve (all of which we visited). We got a mini tour of the spice plantation, got to ride an elephant (which was definitely as cool as I imagined, although it wasn't as scary as I remember it was when I was 8... I can't remember where we were, but I do remember taking an elephant up a pretty large hill with a cliff on one side and a solid rock wall on the other side... for those that haven't been on an elephant it swings side to side while you're on top, so half the time I was either thinking we would eat it down the mountain or get stuck on the rock wall... good times), and met a family of farmers who were drying coffee beans on large mats outside of their hut. There were two really really cute girls, one about 3 and one 5, that followed us around. I said hi to them and managed to snap a pic of them. Hopefully I'll get my act together and get them up at some point... that's a big if tho.
After the spice garden and our elephant ride, a group of us went to dinner at a nearby hotel (hotels here almost always have a restaurant associated with them). Bad idea. Three problems: A) too hot inside, B) the food blew, and C) no dessert. Epic fail. But it did spark a good ending: we got some ice cream downtown, the best I've had since Maple View Farms outside of Carrboro (usually the ice cream here tastes like whipped cream but has the consistency of butter... this time it was different, thankfully). When we got back from our delightful dessert, we experienced something peculiar back at the hotel. We were walking up the stairs when a hotel attendant with a smoking metal cylinder (yes think Christian priest going down the aisle with that smoking cylinder during a mass) filled with incense flailed the metal object around our halls. Quite a way to freshen up a hotel hallway, but man did it smell good (like jasmine flowers dipped in honey... mmmmm)
The next day, we arose at 6:00 AM to take a 3 hour "safari walk" in the Periyar Wildlife Preserve. It was a very nice day-- a comfortable 75 degrees-- and very bright. It was such a nice walk; the sun on your shoulders and the morning mist spraying your face. I often closed my eyes and listened to the sounds of everything going on around me. Such a nice difference from the hustle and bustle of Madurai.I have some pics of this setting as well; it was very beautiful and captured a lot of the sights that I often saw during my time in Kerela-- when I get them up I'll tell you guys so you can see what I mean. We saw lots of monkeys, some bison, a few elephants, and a ton of rare birds. No tiger (sadly), but we did see a tree that had been scratched up by one (that counts right?). An interesting thing about this ecotourist site: all the guides that worked there once were tiger poachers just 10 years before (and have contributed to the tiger's endangered state in India as a whole). Good planning on the preserve's part.
After the reserve, we were let loose on the town for the day. The town of Thekkedy was nothing special. It was just as tourist oriented as Hampi town was, with tons of stores devoted to silk outfits and small handicrafts that you could find almost everywhere (but that shop owners insisted were indigenous to Thekkedy only... that seems to be a common sales tactic in India). I had a good time just browsing the shops, talking to random Indians as I passed, and exploring the town with other SITA members. At night, we went to a very good restaurant to make up for the shittyness that was the night before.
The next day we went to a tea plantation in the morning, where most environmentalists would cringe. On our way there, the hills were absolutely covered in tea plants-- or large bushes about 3 feet tall. It was all very green and pretty, but any environmentalist would look at that situation and say: god that run off must be ridiculous. And they would be right. There were huge gulleys down the sides of these tea plants where rain from the wet season (From Sept to Dec) had torn the land straight apart. I have pics of this also. All in due time.
We got back to the hotel, and then left for Kottayam, a layover city for our journey to Cochin. This is the journey in which I fell in love with the Ghats. The views I saw on that bus ride were like none I've ever seen in the Whites or the Blue Ridges (for all you out west, spare your Sierra Nevada and Rocky nationalism. I'll get out there eventually). I was only able to take a few pictures cause my memory card (which only held 49 pics at the time) was running out of room, and I was on the side of the bus that was most often facing the mountain side, and not the huge valleys and peaks of other mountains in the distance (I got a new camera, thankfully, so this won't be a problem in the future-- this time I didn't get lost). I wish I could describe the views or show you epic pictures, but alas, it was not destined to be so. Stay tuned for the Himalayas!!!!
I think I'm gonna stop here. It's a nice mid-point, and I've been writing for about 2 hrs now... maybe I should really take a class in shortening my details and my points, cause honestly sometimes its just plain exhausting. Anyway, I'll update you on my current status. Right now I'm in the middle of my Independent Study period, during which I need to get a shitload of interviews and literature material to eventually form a 25 page paper about the effect of land purchases by multinational corporations and other groups interested in land ownership on farmers outside of Madurai (yep, that means I'll be spending most my time inside of a village!!!! SO EXCITED-- stay tuned for pics. They're gonna be sweet, guaranteed). This wont be hard and I know it-- I am really interested in the topic and I know that when I start, I won't be able to stop... it's just starting it all that is the problem...
Until tomorrow (when I'll write the rest of tour and update my current status). Love and miss you all, and I wish you were here to experience this country with me-- it's one of those countries that truly changes your life in ways that you can't even imagine. Keep being beautiful people :-)
Hasan
Monday, February 23, 2009
India #5 (or is it 6? I dunno I can't remember): Tour Continued
Hello everyone,
Let's continue Hampi:
One thing I forgot to mention in the previous update: for lunch in Hampi after the ruins visits and the illegal pillar playing, everyone headed toward the internationally-renown restaurant the Mango Tree. What we didn't expect when we approached the restaurant: that we would walk 3 kms from the center of town and through a large banana plantation in order to get there. Literally we left the main road directly beside the river on a dirt path (following the directions of a large sign bearing "to the mango tree" on it... we weren't so skilled as to go this way on mere intuition), through someone's banana fields (bananas here are incredible: they're about half the size of the bananas we import from costa rica, are grown locally, and taste SO good. The taste begins like a regular banana, and then this wave of sweet and sour hits your mouth like there was a pineapple in the center. Local bananas definitely taste the best. Buy local!) and into a restaurant that, from the outset, looked like a shack. When you walked inside the shelter, the restaurant opened up to a panorama view of the river. The restaurant was on a hill, (it reminded me of Cafe Driade in Chapel Hill a lot, altho there were half as many mosquitoes, 10x more ground critters, and a much more appetizing view than the random forest behind it), and the tables were set on each landing, overlooking the river. Your "seats" were the ground, and your tables were much like footrests one would get while purchasing an easy chair at a furniture shop. The food was incredible. Best hummus, HANDS DOWN, that I've ever tasted outside of Israel. The felafel was beyond anything Beth-El ever imported. Given this long drawn out description of a random restaurant in Hampi, I have the following diagnosis as a student studying in India: First, go to Hampi, see the ruins, and experience yourself on a different planet. Then, go to the Mango Tree, at least thrice during your stay. You will not regret it.
The following pic was taken at the Mango Tree. The one after it was us walking along the dirt path to get there:
K, back to what I was originally gonna say in this post: The second day we spent in Hampi has been one of my most favorite times here thus far, barely beating out Jain Hill and the large naked man (the latter two were in contention because of the incredible views... Hampi luckily had them all over the place). We took an auto rikshaw to Hampi from Hospet, underwent planetary transformation once again (see previous post), and arrived on the main street in Hampi. We set off for a small rooftop restaurant (with shade, of course), and ate a very western breakfast. I got french toast, eggs, and filter coffee (aka- espresso, something that you never get here... normally the coffee I drink in Madurai is made from Nescafe mix). There were 10 of us, but only one cook/server/attendent. As such, the breakfast took about 2 hours in total. I kind of felt bad. It got to a point where the guy had to send a kid to a local store to get more supplies just to make our breakfast. Needless to say, we tipped him pretty heavily... He put a lot more into a western breakfast than anyone I've ever known. Pluswhich, the breakfast far outclassed Colby dining services. #4 dining-service-among-all-colleges-in-the-nation fail!
After breakfast we saw that directly next to the restaurant was a cycle rental place. Because we had the full day to do whatever we wanted, we figured, what the hell-- let's work for our enjoyment of the one of the world's most beautiful places. So, for 50 rupees each (only one buck) for a days worth of cycling, we set off across the river for the great unknown. Crossing the river was quite an experience. The only way to cross the river was a rickety wooden motor boat, driven by a very large guy in a straw hat (this was the first time I ever saw an Indian wearing a hat... despite the ridiculous amount of light we endure on a daily basis, somehow being Indian equips you with the ability to see very easily without a hat. Personally, I have to squint for the majority of the day, looking like I'm trying to focus in on something 2 kms down the road, when I'm actually trying to avoid the divet in the road that is a mere 3 feet in front of my cycle). Getting a cycle over the river was an interesting ordeal: you put the cycle on the back of the boat, which is elevated about 3 feet over the water, and balance yourself ON the cycle while a very rocky motor boat scuttles across the river. Thankfully I avoided falling in. A fun part of going across the river: while you're doing so, men who are standing on a nearby rock do cannonballs that often splash you with cool water (something that felt great amidst the 100 degree day... despite the fact that it almost touched my camera... if it had, shit would have gone down).
We reached the other side, and instantly the Indian paparazzi attacked us. Autos asking us "hanuman temple? lake? lake? lake? only 200 rupees there and back!" (only is such an understatement, the lake was like 3 kms away... you usually pay around 50 rupees for a trip like that around Madurai. Unfortunately because autos are often the only way to get to the lake for many tourists, they can rip you off and get away with it). We cycled by them, and headed toward the lake. The other side was beautiful. As you rode down the road leading to the lake, to your left stood small quaint restaurants and guest houses that surprisingly held a large number of Israelis (Hampi's a lovely Israeli hotspot...); to your right lay incredibly green rice patty fields with the rocky mountains jutting up behind it. Here's a pic to give you a better idea:
The drive to the lake was incredible. Words can't describe the landscape. It was literally the most intense green I've seen anywhere on Earth. I'll leave it at that. Swimming in the lake was much like swimming in the abandoned quarry just outside Chapel Hill. Very rocky, yet somehow very clean water. The lake was huge-- think Walden Pond size. If that doesn't make any sense, think Colby lake X100. It was a nice thing to go swimming. It was the first time I had been since I took a very very cold dip in a natural 40 degree pool near the White Mountains in western Maine last sumer (for all those not there, yes, I did scream and howl when I got in, and continued until I got outside). This time, however, the water was much nicer, and a lot warmer, thankfully.
We ate pita, humus, fries, and Israeli salad by the lakeside. One of the more relaxing meals I've ever had. I was suddenly brought back to those picnics I had with my mom and bro at Walden Pond when I lived in Boston (never failing to have a large bag of Kettle Chips with us... of which I ate at least half each time). After failing at the butterfly stroke, walking on water (with the help of a deceptively shallow rock), and finding out a guy's life deal (who was playing a noisy annoying instrument just across the way from our little base by the side of the lake), it was about 5 pm. The last boat across the river was at 6, so we had to hurry. We got back across, took a bus back to Hospet. I know I did a pretty crappy job of describing the epic day, making it sound not really that epic... oh well...
The day after, we took a sunrise hike up a hill beside Hampi, experienced a very orange sunrise (with the Indian haze fully visible... unfortunately :-/), and then left Hospet for Bangalore via overnight train. We checked into the hotel and then started to walk around. As soon as I walked in, I felt empty and had no idea why. Later I would find out that I had left my Colby College Dazzlin' Asses frisbee on the train from Hospet. I held a minor memorial ceremony for it in the hotel room, got over it (barely... I kept thinking how disappointed Lewis would be if I didn't actually teach street boys to play frisbee, ultimately becoming the olympic team for India in 25 years. Alas! It was not meant to be), and started to explore Bangalore. For those who have not been, Bangalore is one of the most developed cities in the south. With that in mind, picture the following scene as I looked down the road: A Ruby Tuesday's just across the street from a 3 story Levi's outlet store, Bars wherever the eye could see (one of which we went into for a beer... then swiftly exited. If you could ever put a spaceship into a room with no windows, this bar would be it. The bar was a sparkly silver; the bartender was dressed like an 80s Michael Jackson straight out of his Thriller music video. The space around the bar was huge, but it was compartmentalized into five different rooms, all separated by glass windows. On the radio was a remix of the popular song "Wagon Wheel". Upon entering, all of us looked at each other, assessed the scene in front of us, and then fled the scene as fast as a walk could take us. I was scarred for life), and thousands of Indians dressed in the latest western fashion. If I had just landed in downtown New York, and if New Yorkians were further south (so that people would tan easier), I wouldn't have known the difference. Mom was right: this was just another Western hole that tourists fall into. I managed to find a restaurant that served Tali meals (for freaking 80 rupees-- normally it's like 35), went back to the hotel, and fell asleep until our overnight train back to Madurai.
Tour was nice, but it was extremely nice to be back and away from the group for a while. We literally spent every single day together for a full week, and I was personally desperately needing alone time. When I got back to my host family's house, I spent some time pestering my 8 yr old host sister, playing football with my brother, and talking about random things with my host mother. Since I got back from tour, I have really come to value my host family so much. My host mother is a truly incredible person, and I have had many very penetrating and personal conversations with her, to the point that I actually felt more like her son than some random kid who she houses for money (they receive a lot of money from SITA for helping us out). In addition, I have become a brother to my siblings, someone they look up to. My host sister, who is barred from touching any person of the opposite sex if it isn't a guy her own age or a sibling as commanded by the caste system/society as a whole, and I have broken that barrier (k, that sounds wrong, I know, let me explain: physical love among members of a similar family does not happen very often at all. Hugging here is not something you do; in fact it's kind of hillarious to see how each Indian reacts to a hug-- some freeze and don't touch back at all, which makes for an awkward ordeal. Others just receive it, laugh and then return it cautiously. To emphasize, I have never once seen my host parents hug one of their children, let alone each other. Over the past few weeks, my host siblings have hugged me many times, a "physical" sign that I have become an integral part of the family as a son/sibling. YAY! :-)). My host brother is someone I wish I was when I was 13: smooth talking, one of the smartest in his grade, and VERY funny. I wish I could describe to you how many times I've spent my afternoon laughing with him, but words wouldn't do it justice I feel. Anyways, my life at home is awesome :-).
I started my "experience culture" part of the SITA program (which is weird... isn't being here a cultural excursion in itself?). Just to be predictable, I decided to take Karnataka Vocals. I had my first class 3 weeks ago, and I CAN"T get enough of it! Kevin would really hate the way we learn: everything is by ear, no sheet music or anything. To me, a dwindling sight reader, it is the perfect way to learn. The way that Karnatak music is charted out is through a syllable system (much like do, re, mi; except the scale goes like this: sa, ri, ga, ma, pa, da, ni, sa). Time is kept by beating with your hand on your knee. Time is charted out using vertical dashes and double verticle dashes, the former showing the first half of a phrase, and the latter for the phrase's finish. When I get back to the states, I'll sing some stuff for you guys-- the scales that you learn are truly remarkable, and if you happen to be interested, I can teach you how to do some of the stuff I'm doing as well!
On the cooking front, I have now learned how to make the following things: Sambar (a sauce you put on rice or eat with Dosai-- the rice/lentil pancake I've mentioned before), Dosai, Iddili (steamed dosai batter-- are like half moon cookies in shape, but couldn't be further from it in taste), 4 different types of chutney, and Ochre masala. When I get back to Colby in the fall, I'm definitely going to prepare a feast. Perhaps we could organize a form of community dinner-- OMG Thanksgiving dinner S. Indian style? PLEASE?! Sorry for being so excited, but the food here is sooo good (and full of spices and goodies-- spices in a not hot manner, like in a DELICIOUS manner). Anyways, Next on my agenda: Rasam, beet root masala, Addai.
I also forgot to tell you guys about my daily routine: each morning I get up at around 6:30 (yes guys, I actually WILLINGLY get up at 6:30!!! it feels great-- Steven Tatko, I now know why you do it so often :-)), take a bucket shower, do some last minute work, work out a bit, drink coffee, eat delicious food, and then cycle to the SITA center against the early morning traffic at 8:00 (haven't had any incident since that initial auto rikshaw scare... altho I have almost gone barreling into a bus on numerous occasions). At SITA, I always start my day with a healthy dose of an hour and a half of tamil, then have coffee, then go to my nxt class, eat lunch, nxt. class, coffee again (which is why I'm addicted now... which I really don't like!), next class, then I often go home at around 5:30 to play random games with my host siblings and the neighbors (WHICH I"M DEFINITELY TEACHING YOU GUYS WHEN I GET HOME OR BUST). Two day ago I introduced four square to them. That's their current obsession. If I don't have a class during a period (I only tke 4/7 classes they offer here), I either explore the area by cycle, do work (which is what I've been doing lately, which I hate...), or go update you guys in the nearby internet cafe (which is still like .30 cents an hour :-)). After play time, I eat dinner, usually do homework, watch a tv program in tamil with my family, and then start getting ready for bed.
Here's where it gets interesting. Mosquitoes here are INTENSE. They usually come out at two times en masse: dawn and dusk. When either of these two times set in, all windows and doors to the outside are closed, though lots of them still get in (somehow, I'm still trying to find that hidden crook...). So every night before I go to bed, there are around 10-15 mosquitoes chillin in my room, waiting to eat me alive while I sleep. Well, unfortunately for them, I don't like to get bitten. As such, among my nightly rituals is the following pencilled in item: Mosquito slaughter. That's right, I kill as many as I can and then sleep happier and with less bites on my person, which frankly, I can deal with. It sometimes takes up to 30 minutes to corner most of them, and often I just let one fly around while I go to sleep, but if I didn't do that, I would get close to no sleep. Laugh if you must, at the image of me running around my room with my two hands a foot away from each other chasing a flying being that is merely 2 cm long. It's good exercise anyway, and certainly gets me tired enough to just drop into bed and sleep through the night.
I was unaware, however, that dead mosquitoes attract ants. I realized this a little bit too late... and now I have an ant sanctuary and a mosquito morgue as a room. Fortunately, the cycle of life evens itself out. Personally I have no problem with ants. They actually are really fun to watch as a break between theoretical readings about the socio-political situation in southern India. The way they cooperate to transport food from the trash can in my room or stray food in the kitchen just across the hall from my room is quite miraculous. I once experienced a banana peel being brought from the kitchen, under the door, and up to the window sill. Unfortunately ants lack depth perception, and thus realized that it was quite impossible to get the banana peel outside the small 1 cm crack in the window. At this point they needed human intervention, so I opened the window and nudged it out the window. I would hesitate to call it beautiful, and a lot of you are probably going "why am I reading about Hasan's current obsession with the ants he feeds." Suffice it to say that ants are an integral part of my night-- the large ant march through my room to the kitchen is an ongoing obstacle that I must be aware of as I walk up and down my room.
As bad as it sounds, I've been benefitting from the underground movie trade quite a lot. To emphasize, I got 12 movies the other day for 120 rupees. That's a steal. 2 dollars and 10 cents for 12 movies that would cost at LEAST 120 dollars int he states. Not even Wal-Mart can top the Meenakshi Bazaar prices just outside the Meenakshi temple. There is one danger: all the movies are burnt onto CDs, and a lot of them don't work at all. I'm gonna stock up on movies that I've always wanted here, so an added bonus for next year: I'll be better stalked than the secret stash!
Other than that, I've been slowly trying to lay off the coffee (i've been trying chocolate milk-- my host fam calls it boost-- at home instead of caffinating myself), writing continually, and reading a lot of articles for this upcoming week from hell (4 essays, one interview with a person who doesn't speak english, and one test... good luck me!). Good news: after Friday it'll all be over, and our second tour to Kerela, the neighboring state to the west, starts this coming Sunday.
Since Annie Roos demanded an update on my current status: I am very happy here in India. Every experience I have here continues an ongoing growing experience that began when I was last here in 1996, and I am enjoying every moment of it. If you've made it this far down this update, I congratulate you. This was a bulky one, but it had to be updated at some point. Stay tuned before tour for other random things about Madurai and about SITA as a whole :-)
I love and miss every single one of you (even you Hazel, even though you can't really speak English... though given your past of hopping onto table tops, I wouldn't be surprised if you had started to peek on one of my emails that my mom reads), and I hope everything is going well on your end. Update me as always and I'll see you on the flip side.
Hasan Bhatti, Certified Indian Cycler
Let's continue Hampi:
One thing I forgot to mention in the previous update: for lunch in Hampi after the ruins visits and the illegal pillar playing, everyone headed toward the internationally-renown restaurant the Mango Tree. What we didn't expect when we approached the restaurant: that we would walk 3 kms from the center of town and through a large banana plantation in order to get there. Literally we left the main road directly beside the river on a dirt path (following the directions of a large sign bearing "to the mango tree" on it... we weren't so skilled as to go this way on mere intuition), through someone's banana fields (bananas here are incredible: they're about half the size of the bananas we import from costa rica, are grown locally, and taste SO good. The taste begins like a regular banana, and then this wave of sweet and sour hits your mouth like there was a pineapple in the center. Local bananas definitely taste the best. Buy local!) and into a restaurant that, from the outset, looked like a shack. When you walked inside the shelter, the restaurant opened up to a panorama view of the river. The restaurant was on a hill, (it reminded me of Cafe Driade in Chapel Hill a lot, altho there were half as many mosquitoes, 10x more ground critters, and a much more appetizing view than the random forest behind it), and the tables were set on each landing, overlooking the river. Your "seats" were the ground, and your tables were much like footrests one would get while purchasing an easy chair at a furniture shop. The food was incredible. Best hummus, HANDS DOWN, that I've ever tasted outside of Israel. The felafel was beyond anything Beth-El ever imported. Given this long drawn out description of a random restaurant in Hampi, I have the following diagnosis as a student studying in India: First, go to Hampi, see the ruins, and experience yourself on a different planet. Then, go to the Mango Tree, at least thrice during your stay. You will not regret it.
The following pic was taken at the Mango Tree. The one after it was us walking along the dirt path to get there:
K, back to what I was originally gonna say in this post: The second day we spent in Hampi has been one of my most favorite times here thus far, barely beating out Jain Hill and the large naked man (the latter two were in contention because of the incredible views... Hampi luckily had them all over the place). We took an auto rikshaw to Hampi from Hospet, underwent planetary transformation once again (see previous post), and arrived on the main street in Hampi. We set off for a small rooftop restaurant (with shade, of course), and ate a very western breakfast. I got french toast, eggs, and filter coffee (aka- espresso, something that you never get here... normally the coffee I drink in Madurai is made from Nescafe mix). There were 10 of us, but only one cook/server/attendent. As such, the breakfast took about 2 hours in total. I kind of felt bad. It got to a point where the guy had to send a kid to a local store to get more supplies just to make our breakfast. Needless to say, we tipped him pretty heavily... He put a lot more into a western breakfast than anyone I've ever known. Pluswhich, the breakfast far outclassed Colby dining services. #4 dining-service-among-all-colleges-in-the-nation fail!
After breakfast we saw that directly next to the restaurant was a cycle rental place. Because we had the full day to do whatever we wanted, we figured, what the hell-- let's work for our enjoyment of the one of the world's most beautiful places. So, for 50 rupees each (only one buck) for a days worth of cycling, we set off across the river for the great unknown. Crossing the river was quite an experience. The only way to cross the river was a rickety wooden motor boat, driven by a very large guy in a straw hat (this was the first time I ever saw an Indian wearing a hat... despite the ridiculous amount of light we endure on a daily basis, somehow being Indian equips you with the ability to see very easily without a hat. Personally, I have to squint for the majority of the day, looking like I'm trying to focus in on something 2 kms down the road, when I'm actually trying to avoid the divet in the road that is a mere 3 feet in front of my cycle). Getting a cycle over the river was an interesting ordeal: you put the cycle on the back of the boat, which is elevated about 3 feet over the water, and balance yourself ON the cycle while a very rocky motor boat scuttles across the river. Thankfully I avoided falling in. A fun part of going across the river: while you're doing so, men who are standing on a nearby rock do cannonballs that often splash you with cool water (something that felt great amidst the 100 degree day... despite the fact that it almost touched my camera... if it had, shit would have gone down).
We reached the other side, and instantly the Indian paparazzi attacked us. Autos asking us "hanuman temple? lake? lake? lake? only 200 rupees there and back!" (only is such an understatement, the lake was like 3 kms away... you usually pay around 50 rupees for a trip like that around Madurai. Unfortunately because autos are often the only way to get to the lake for many tourists, they can rip you off and get away with it). We cycled by them, and headed toward the lake. The other side was beautiful. As you rode down the road leading to the lake, to your left stood small quaint restaurants and guest houses that surprisingly held a large number of Israelis (Hampi's a lovely Israeli hotspot...); to your right lay incredibly green rice patty fields with the rocky mountains jutting up behind it. Here's a pic to give you a better idea:
The drive to the lake was incredible. Words can't describe the landscape. It was literally the most intense green I've seen anywhere on Earth. I'll leave it at that. Swimming in the lake was much like swimming in the abandoned quarry just outside Chapel Hill. Very rocky, yet somehow very clean water. The lake was huge-- think Walden Pond size. If that doesn't make any sense, think Colby lake X100. It was a nice thing to go swimming. It was the first time I had been since I took a very very cold dip in a natural 40 degree pool near the White Mountains in western Maine last sumer (for all those not there, yes, I did scream and howl when I got in, and continued until I got outside). This time, however, the water was much nicer, and a lot warmer, thankfully.
We ate pita, humus, fries, and Israeli salad by the lakeside. One of the more relaxing meals I've ever had. I was suddenly brought back to those picnics I had with my mom and bro at Walden Pond when I lived in Boston (never failing to have a large bag of Kettle Chips with us... of which I ate at least half each time). After failing at the butterfly stroke, walking on water (with the help of a deceptively shallow rock), and finding out a guy's life deal (who was playing a noisy annoying instrument just across the way from our little base by the side of the lake), it was about 5 pm. The last boat across the river was at 6, so we had to hurry. We got back across, took a bus back to Hospet. I know I did a pretty crappy job of describing the epic day, making it sound not really that epic... oh well...
The day after, we took a sunrise hike up a hill beside Hampi, experienced a very orange sunrise (with the Indian haze fully visible... unfortunately :-/), and then left Hospet for Bangalore via overnight train. We checked into the hotel and then started to walk around. As soon as I walked in, I felt empty and had no idea why. Later I would find out that I had left my Colby College Dazzlin' Asses frisbee on the train from Hospet. I held a minor memorial ceremony for it in the hotel room, got over it (barely... I kept thinking how disappointed Lewis would be if I didn't actually teach street boys to play frisbee, ultimately becoming the olympic team for India in 25 years. Alas! It was not meant to be), and started to explore Bangalore. For those who have not been, Bangalore is one of the most developed cities in the south. With that in mind, picture the following scene as I looked down the road: A Ruby Tuesday's just across the street from a 3 story Levi's outlet store, Bars wherever the eye could see (one of which we went into for a beer... then swiftly exited. If you could ever put a spaceship into a room with no windows, this bar would be it. The bar was a sparkly silver; the bartender was dressed like an 80s Michael Jackson straight out of his Thriller music video. The space around the bar was huge, but it was compartmentalized into five different rooms, all separated by glass windows. On the radio was a remix of the popular song "Wagon Wheel". Upon entering, all of us looked at each other, assessed the scene in front of us, and then fled the scene as fast as a walk could take us. I was scarred for life), and thousands of Indians dressed in the latest western fashion. If I had just landed in downtown New York, and if New Yorkians were further south (so that people would tan easier), I wouldn't have known the difference. Mom was right: this was just another Western hole that tourists fall into. I managed to find a restaurant that served Tali meals (for freaking 80 rupees-- normally it's like 35), went back to the hotel, and fell asleep until our overnight train back to Madurai.
Tour was nice, but it was extremely nice to be back and away from the group for a while. We literally spent every single day together for a full week, and I was personally desperately needing alone time. When I got back to my host family's house, I spent some time pestering my 8 yr old host sister, playing football with my brother, and talking about random things with my host mother. Since I got back from tour, I have really come to value my host family so much. My host mother is a truly incredible person, and I have had many very penetrating and personal conversations with her, to the point that I actually felt more like her son than some random kid who she houses for money (they receive a lot of money from SITA for helping us out). In addition, I have become a brother to my siblings, someone they look up to. My host sister, who is barred from touching any person of the opposite sex if it isn't a guy her own age or a sibling as commanded by the caste system/society as a whole, and I have broken that barrier (k, that sounds wrong, I know, let me explain: physical love among members of a similar family does not happen very often at all. Hugging here is not something you do; in fact it's kind of hillarious to see how each Indian reacts to a hug-- some freeze and don't touch back at all, which makes for an awkward ordeal. Others just receive it, laugh and then return it cautiously. To emphasize, I have never once seen my host parents hug one of their children, let alone each other. Over the past few weeks, my host siblings have hugged me many times, a "physical" sign that I have become an integral part of the family as a son/sibling. YAY! :-)). My host brother is someone I wish I was when I was 13: smooth talking, one of the smartest in his grade, and VERY funny. I wish I could describe to you how many times I've spent my afternoon laughing with him, but words wouldn't do it justice I feel. Anyways, my life at home is awesome :-).
I started my "experience culture" part of the SITA program (which is weird... isn't being here a cultural excursion in itself?). Just to be predictable, I decided to take Karnataka Vocals. I had my first class 3 weeks ago, and I CAN"T get enough of it! Kevin would really hate the way we learn: everything is by ear, no sheet music or anything. To me, a dwindling sight reader, it is the perfect way to learn. The way that Karnatak music is charted out is through a syllable system (much like do, re, mi; except the scale goes like this: sa, ri, ga, ma, pa, da, ni, sa). Time is kept by beating with your hand on your knee. Time is charted out using vertical dashes and double verticle dashes, the former showing the first half of a phrase, and the latter for the phrase's finish. When I get back to the states, I'll sing some stuff for you guys-- the scales that you learn are truly remarkable, and if you happen to be interested, I can teach you how to do some of the stuff I'm doing as well!
On the cooking front, I have now learned how to make the following things: Sambar (a sauce you put on rice or eat with Dosai-- the rice/lentil pancake I've mentioned before), Dosai, Iddili (steamed dosai batter-- are like half moon cookies in shape, but couldn't be further from it in taste), 4 different types of chutney, and Ochre masala. When I get back to Colby in the fall, I'm definitely going to prepare a feast. Perhaps we could organize a form of community dinner-- OMG Thanksgiving dinner S. Indian style? PLEASE?! Sorry for being so excited, but the food here is sooo good (and full of spices and goodies-- spices in a not hot manner, like in a DELICIOUS manner). Anyways, Next on my agenda: Rasam, beet root masala, Addai.
I also forgot to tell you guys about my daily routine: each morning I get up at around 6:30 (yes guys, I actually WILLINGLY get up at 6:30!!! it feels great-- Steven Tatko, I now know why you do it so often :-)), take a bucket shower, do some last minute work, work out a bit, drink coffee, eat delicious food, and then cycle to the SITA center against the early morning traffic at 8:00 (haven't had any incident since that initial auto rikshaw scare... altho I have almost gone barreling into a bus on numerous occasions). At SITA, I always start my day with a healthy dose of an hour and a half of tamil, then have coffee, then go to my nxt class, eat lunch, nxt. class, coffee again (which is why I'm addicted now... which I really don't like!), next class, then I often go home at around 5:30 to play random games with my host siblings and the neighbors (WHICH I"M DEFINITELY TEACHING YOU GUYS WHEN I GET HOME OR BUST). Two day ago I introduced four square to them. That's their current obsession. If I don't have a class during a period (I only tke 4/7 classes they offer here), I either explore the area by cycle, do work (which is what I've been doing lately, which I hate...), or go update you guys in the nearby internet cafe (which is still like .30 cents an hour :-)). After play time, I eat dinner, usually do homework, watch a tv program in tamil with my family, and then start getting ready for bed.
Here's where it gets interesting. Mosquitoes here are INTENSE. They usually come out at two times en masse: dawn and dusk. When either of these two times set in, all windows and doors to the outside are closed, though lots of them still get in (somehow, I'm still trying to find that hidden crook...). So every night before I go to bed, there are around 10-15 mosquitoes chillin in my room, waiting to eat me alive while I sleep. Well, unfortunately for them, I don't like to get bitten. As such, among my nightly rituals is the following pencilled in item: Mosquito slaughter. That's right, I kill as many as I can and then sleep happier and with less bites on my person, which frankly, I can deal with. It sometimes takes up to 30 minutes to corner most of them, and often I just let one fly around while I go to sleep, but if I didn't do that, I would get close to no sleep. Laugh if you must, at the image of me running around my room with my two hands a foot away from each other chasing a flying being that is merely 2 cm long. It's good exercise anyway, and certainly gets me tired enough to just drop into bed and sleep through the night.
I was unaware, however, that dead mosquitoes attract ants. I realized this a little bit too late... and now I have an ant sanctuary and a mosquito morgue as a room. Fortunately, the cycle of life evens itself out. Personally I have no problem with ants. They actually are really fun to watch as a break between theoretical readings about the socio-political situation in southern India. The way they cooperate to transport food from the trash can in my room or stray food in the kitchen just across the hall from my room is quite miraculous. I once experienced a banana peel being brought from the kitchen, under the door, and up to the window sill. Unfortunately ants lack depth perception, and thus realized that it was quite impossible to get the banana peel outside the small 1 cm crack in the window. At this point they needed human intervention, so I opened the window and nudged it out the window. I would hesitate to call it beautiful, and a lot of you are probably going "why am I reading about Hasan's current obsession with the ants he feeds." Suffice it to say that ants are an integral part of my night-- the large ant march through my room to the kitchen is an ongoing obstacle that I must be aware of as I walk up and down my room.
As bad as it sounds, I've been benefitting from the underground movie trade quite a lot. To emphasize, I got 12 movies the other day for 120 rupees. That's a steal. 2 dollars and 10 cents for 12 movies that would cost at LEAST 120 dollars int he states. Not even Wal-Mart can top the Meenakshi Bazaar prices just outside the Meenakshi temple. There is one danger: all the movies are burnt onto CDs, and a lot of them don't work at all. I'm gonna stock up on movies that I've always wanted here, so an added bonus for next year: I'll be better stalked than the secret stash!
Other than that, I've been slowly trying to lay off the coffee (i've been trying chocolate milk-- my host fam calls it boost-- at home instead of caffinating myself), writing continually, and reading a lot of articles for this upcoming week from hell (4 essays, one interview with a person who doesn't speak english, and one test... good luck me!). Good news: after Friday it'll all be over, and our second tour to Kerela, the neighboring state to the west, starts this coming Sunday.
Since Annie Roos demanded an update on my current status: I am very happy here in India. Every experience I have here continues an ongoing growing experience that began when I was last here in 1996, and I am enjoying every moment of it. If you've made it this far down this update, I congratulate you. This was a bulky one, but it had to be updated at some point. Stay tuned before tour for other random things about Madurai and about SITA as a whole :-)
I love and miss every single one of you (even you Hazel, even though you can't really speak English... though given your past of hopping onto table tops, I wouldn't be surprised if you had started to peek on one of my emails that my mom reads), and I hope everything is going well on your end. Update me as always and I'll see you on the flip side.
Hasan Bhatti, Certified Indian Cycler
Wednesday, February 18, 2009
India #4: Hampi, The Most Beautiful Place in the...
World.
In the whole wide world.
Yeah.
Hello everyone,
Let's take a small step back. et me recap as fast as I can my travels in the neighboring state of Karnataka (NW of Madurai). It's probably going to be split into two posts (cause I need to do a ton of work desperately today-- seriously SITA? Why would you bog me down with work when I'm trying to love to India... figuratively...). I think Mysore and the first half of Hampi will be today. Friday I'll write the other half.
We left Madurai on an overnight train headed for Mysore three Saturdays ago (it really has been a long time since I've updated). The overnight train experience was quite that: an experience. We were seated in an AC three tier car that had no compartments, meaning we had to lock our bags and hope they didn't get stolen in the middle of the night. This was my first three tier train trip that I have ever taken (mom can correct that insignificant fact if she so chooses). Three tier essentially means that there are three beds on each side of a compartment (one is the seat you sit on, one you have to chain into place-- don't worry, the chains are quite sturdy... I think Shaq might be pushing it-- and the last one is kind of like the top of a bunk bed without a bunk-- chained to the ceiling). So that would mean there were six people in each compartment. When we finally set up the beds and got down to sleeping, I found it surprisingly cozy, and fell asleep within seconds of hitting the "mattress". I have snippets of being on two tier trains when I hardly slept at all traveling from Varanasi to Delhi to Jaipur (all three of which are in the north) engrained in my memory, so the fact that I fell asleep as soon as I hit the bed (and laid down the sheets that had housed about a billion people before me... yeah, it was not a very sanitary exp. The first thing I did when I got to Mysore was take a 20 minute shower) was quite surprising. I was just about to chomp on a massive ice cream sundae that my mom had bought for me from a horse vendor (don't ask me, it was a dream) when at 2:00 am, my dreamy euphoria came to a screeching halt. A man, cursed be his soul, decided to answer his cell phone and SCREAM into it. I am not exaggerating. the man screamed into that technological communicative device as if he expected people on the moon to hear him before the person on the receiver end... I almost got up and gave him a swift kick in the nuts with my left foot-- the foot that is considered the most unholy of all limb parts in Tamil... fortunately the PA got to him before I did and he shut up. *Sigh* my bad luck on overnight trains continued.
After a very very long bumpy ride, we reached Mysore. We all stumbled into jeeps the size of safari rangers and were lugged to the hotel at which we would stay for the next three days. After a long shower, me and the three other guys on the group started to explore the area. As soon as we walked out of the hotel door we were instantly bombarded by street vendors and auto rickshaw drivers, or as I like to call it, the Indian Papa Razzi. While we waded through the crowd, a man by the name of Joseph (or so he convinced me) started to talk to us. He told us that he worked in a coffee shop just up the road, and somehow convinced us that there was a "sunday only market" near his shop. We figured why not-- let's go see a market. We set off towards the market. As we walked, I began to notice many many differences from Madurai. For one, people actually used the sidewalks (yeah Sakshi, I'm shocked too). Second, the streets were extremely clean, even though I did manage to experience a cow repaving the road with natural excrement (which was then herded off by angry policemen). There were no trash piles or dust ranges anywhere. Third, there were POLICEMEN directing traffic (at stoplights... see stoplights here are more like guidelines... really, so people need an authoritative figure to keep them in check). I could go on and on with the differences. Suffice it to say that Mysore is much more "developed" than Madurai.
Anyway, I began to talk with Joseph; what a character. He had a black pinstriped nike hat with a steve tatko-like collared shirt, bellbottom pants, and a very Jay-Z like swagger. I began to ask him about his life-- he was 23 years old, just out of a local indian college. Throughout our convo about random things such as Obama, English TV and Indian auto rickshaws, he would continually ask me if I would like some hash or marijuana, never failing to add to his offer the following saying: "In Mysore we drink till we die, smoke till we fly... no woman no cry" (which STILL makes no sense to me). I declined him about 19 times before he decided I was a prude. Possessing drugs is illegal in India like in the US, and I would also get kicked off my program for even possessing them... so no dice (Joseph swore that it was legal in Mysore... then again, Joseph swore a lot of things). That on top of the fact that I actually don't really have any need for it. After an awkward 20 minutes to the market, he brought us inside. It was so colorful here; I was in love (not that I hadn't been this whole time here). "this isn't even the big market downtown" Joseph said. As we walked between onion baskets and tea stalls serving coffee in tall beer-like glasses, Joseph ushered us into a man's house. Joseph then bid us adieu, and a man came in and gave us a full run down of the perfume situation in Mysore. and I mean run down: the man had papers explaining each of his magical sensory potions, most of which smelled incredible. We also got to see a woman actually roll incense onto an incense stick that would eventually be sold on the street 3 hours later (side note: there was an incense called "Musk". The description, verbatim: meant to bring the inner aphrodisiac in you. Known to attract females and provide many, ahem, benefits...). After his presentation, he insisted that we buy some. I felt bad not doing it, since we would have just wasted 20 minutes of his life if we hadn't bought anything. I bought one called "lotus" which kind of smelled like Curve cologne back at home (it is supposed to "calm the senses" and "relieve stress" which are always good things). After exiting, we headed back to the hotel area to an Andhara restaurant. Hands downt he best sambar, rasam, and veg meal I've ever had. If you ever manage to make it to Mysore (which is definitely worth a two day stay), go to Hotel RRR (hotel can be used to describe a restaurant here in addition to a hotel). Be advised, those with very low spice tolerances (cough, Emma, cough) must temper the flavor explosion with a bit of curd (which is also provided).
That night, we went to the Mysore Palace. Incredible architecture-- there was a hall that would provide pretty hefty competition to the ball room in Disney's Beauty and the Beast. I'll let pictures tell this architectural story-- aka, click the link above. All I'll say is that the compound was ENORMOUS (like 10 acres of stone, marble, and murals). Beautiful place.
That night, I had my first legal drink in India. A Kingfisher 650 ml light brown beer. Not great, but it rekindled memories of the days of toasting miller high life with Kevin after being plunked on. Sentimental value is all that matters when it comes to booze anyway, I feel.
The next day we visited the "second tallest monolithic (aka, carved out of a single rock) statue in the world" located about an hour and a half away from Mysore. It was a jain man. He stood at 17.5 meters tall, blaringly stark naked (schlong included). In a way, it was beautiful yet also disturbing. He was situated on a large hill, only accessible by a 600 step staircase carved into the hill (hills here are mostly giant stones that randomly jut out from the relatively flat horizon). The site was one of the more holy places for those practicing the Jain religion, housing two temples, one of which was this massive naked man's dwelling place. As we walked up the stone mountain, I saw a number of carvings in Karnatak (the language in Karnatak) that had been left there by Jains who had visited the sites in the past. I don't know the exact date it was erected (poor word choice I know), but a guy at the bottom told me in broken english "it's, you know, abuh abuh (the South Indian "um") ooooollllddd." The view was to die for. Again I should probably let pictures do the talking here. I do have a story. When we got to the top, me and Mark climbed a hidden ladder (made of bamboo, so you knew it was illegal) to a landing that showed the backside of the huge statue (the backside was huge, in tail-- see pics when I get them up). Behind the statue was open landscape for miles and miles on end. Pics will elucidate this part of the story. Eventually police guys caught on and started to yell at us to get down. You only live once!
We climbed down the hill, ate lunch, went back to mysore, got more papa razzi attention, and then decided to climb the huge hill just outside Mysore This hill, housed 1000 steps. I got a work out, my limbs were sore, but I did it. At the top, the view was very disappointing: haze from the city made it impossible to see more than a few miles. We did experience social injustice. A young monkey had gotten a hold of a batch of bananas, and was about to eat them when a huge mammoth of a monkey attacked the young one and ate all the bananas IN FRONT OF THE LITTLE GUY. We all stood there cursing the fat monkey for being a horrible monkey being. It was a good bonding experience.
We were free for most of the next day. Me and a couple of people went to the Mysore market. It was huge, colorful, and by god I would argue that you could get any piece of produce you could ever want there (local crops, that is). Much more colorful than the "sunday only market", this market spanned about a km. It was huge. We bought some nuts and fruit for the imminent night train ride (which went well, only problem was that I woke up at 3 and couldn't fall back asleep... sigh...)
That night we packed everything up and set off for Hospet, a small village outside of Hampi (there are no guest houses in Hampi that would house 20 people for a night, so we had to settle for Hospet). After checking into the hotel, we set off for Hampi. Words cannot describe that first trip. Inside of safari-like jeeps (again), we began to see randomly placed hills upon hills of rock jutting over intensely green landscapes (most of which were rice paddie fields/locally run banana farms). Instantly we were surrounded by rock, it looked like the Israeli desert mixed with the view from just outside the Colby library (lovejoy side). Green and brown and orange shot out at you as the sun hit everything in view. It was an attack on the vision, the best one I've ever had. I don't have many pics of the drive there, but I do have a lot of the ruins and the landscape of Hampi (link above). The good news: those are only HALF the pics I have of Hampi.
The first day we explored the ruins. Truly beautiful architecture. The ruins were of the late Vijayanagar empire that ruled until the 16-17th century. (pics will make this clearer). The most cool piece of architecture, because I'm a huge music dork, was of the temple in the middle of one of the compounds in olden Hampi. The temple had these pillars upon pillars, about 5 feet and length, and were on every single structure within the temple. What was so special about these pillars? Well if you had a mallet (or a fist), whenever you hit the pillars, they would produce a different musical note. Yup. *cue Kevin's gaping mouth and "I have to go there"*. As if the landscape didn't give me enough evidence, I was truly in a heaven on earth.
That's all for now. I'll save my epic day in Hampi for my next post. I have to go eat lunch (funny how that always seems to work out... it's like the blogging gods' curse or something). Love and miss you all, keep being beautiful people, and tell me about your whereabouts!
Pakkalam,
Hasan
In the whole wide world.
Yeah.
Hello everyone,
Let's take a small step back. et me recap as fast as I can my travels in the neighboring state of Karnataka (NW of Madurai). It's probably going to be split into two posts (cause I need to do a ton of work desperately today-- seriously SITA? Why would you bog me down with work when I'm trying to love to India... figuratively...). I think Mysore and the first half of Hampi will be today. Friday I'll write the other half.
We left Madurai on an overnight train headed for Mysore three Saturdays ago (it really has been a long time since I've updated). The overnight train experience was quite that: an experience. We were seated in an AC three tier car that had no compartments, meaning we had to lock our bags and hope they didn't get stolen in the middle of the night. This was my first three tier train trip that I have ever taken (mom can correct that insignificant fact if she so chooses). Three tier essentially means that there are three beds on each side of a compartment (one is the seat you sit on, one you have to chain into place-- don't worry, the chains are quite sturdy... I think Shaq might be pushing it-- and the last one is kind of like the top of a bunk bed without a bunk-- chained to the ceiling). So that would mean there were six people in each compartment. When we finally set up the beds and got down to sleeping, I found it surprisingly cozy, and fell asleep within seconds of hitting the "mattress". I have snippets of being on two tier trains when I hardly slept at all traveling from Varanasi to Delhi to Jaipur (all three of which are in the north) engrained in my memory, so the fact that I fell asleep as soon as I hit the bed (and laid down the sheets that had housed about a billion people before me... yeah, it was not a very sanitary exp. The first thing I did when I got to Mysore was take a 20 minute shower) was quite surprising. I was just about to chomp on a massive ice cream sundae that my mom had bought for me from a horse vendor (don't ask me, it was a dream) when at 2:00 am, my dreamy euphoria came to a screeching halt. A man, cursed be his soul, decided to answer his cell phone and SCREAM into it. I am not exaggerating. the man screamed into that technological communicative device as if he expected people on the moon to hear him before the person on the receiver end... I almost got up and gave him a swift kick in the nuts with my left foot-- the foot that is considered the most unholy of all limb parts in Tamil... fortunately the PA got to him before I did and he shut up. *Sigh* my bad luck on overnight trains continued.
After a very very long bumpy ride, we reached Mysore. We all stumbled into jeeps the size of safari rangers and were lugged to the hotel at which we would stay for the next three days. After a long shower, me and the three other guys on the group started to explore the area. As soon as we walked out of the hotel door we were instantly bombarded by street vendors and auto rickshaw drivers, or as I like to call it, the Indian Papa Razzi. While we waded through the crowd, a man by the name of Joseph (or so he convinced me) started to talk to us. He told us that he worked in a coffee shop just up the road, and somehow convinced us that there was a "sunday only market" near his shop. We figured why not-- let's go see a market. We set off towards the market. As we walked, I began to notice many many differences from Madurai. For one, people actually used the sidewalks (yeah Sakshi, I'm shocked too). Second, the streets were extremely clean, even though I did manage to experience a cow repaving the road with natural excrement (which was then herded off by angry policemen). There were no trash piles or dust ranges anywhere. Third, there were POLICEMEN directing traffic (at stoplights... see stoplights here are more like guidelines... really, so people need an authoritative figure to keep them in check). I could go on and on with the differences. Suffice it to say that Mysore is much more "developed" than Madurai.
Anyway, I began to talk with Joseph; what a character. He had a black pinstriped nike hat with a steve tatko-like collared shirt, bellbottom pants, and a very Jay-Z like swagger. I began to ask him about his life-- he was 23 years old, just out of a local indian college. Throughout our convo about random things such as Obama, English TV and Indian auto rickshaws, he would continually ask me if I would like some hash or marijuana, never failing to add to his offer the following saying: "In Mysore we drink till we die, smoke till we fly... no woman no cry" (which STILL makes no sense to me). I declined him about 19 times before he decided I was a prude. Possessing drugs is illegal in India like in the US, and I would also get kicked off my program for even possessing them... so no dice (Joseph swore that it was legal in Mysore... then again, Joseph swore a lot of things). That on top of the fact that I actually don't really have any need for it. After an awkward 20 minutes to the market, he brought us inside. It was so colorful here; I was in love (not that I hadn't been this whole time here). "this isn't even the big market downtown" Joseph said. As we walked between onion baskets and tea stalls serving coffee in tall beer-like glasses, Joseph ushered us into a man's house. Joseph then bid us adieu, and a man came in and gave us a full run down of the perfume situation in Mysore. and I mean run down: the man had papers explaining each of his magical sensory potions, most of which smelled incredible. We also got to see a woman actually roll incense onto an incense stick that would eventually be sold on the street 3 hours later (side note: there was an incense called "Musk". The description, verbatim: meant to bring the inner aphrodisiac in you. Known to attract females and provide many, ahem, benefits...). After his presentation, he insisted that we buy some. I felt bad not doing it, since we would have just wasted 20 minutes of his life if we hadn't bought anything. I bought one called "lotus" which kind of smelled like Curve cologne back at home (it is supposed to "calm the senses" and "relieve stress" which are always good things). After exiting, we headed back to the hotel area to an Andhara restaurant. Hands downt he best sambar, rasam, and veg meal I've ever had. If you ever manage to make it to Mysore (which is definitely worth a two day stay), go to Hotel RRR (hotel can be used to describe a restaurant here in addition to a hotel). Be advised, those with very low spice tolerances (cough, Emma, cough) must temper the flavor explosion with a bit of curd (which is also provided).
That night, we went to the Mysore Palace. Incredible architecture-- there was a hall that would provide pretty hefty competition to the ball room in Disney's Beauty and the Beast. I'll let pictures tell this architectural story-- aka, click the link above. All I'll say is that the compound was ENORMOUS (like 10 acres of stone, marble, and murals). Beautiful place.
That night, I had my first legal drink in India. A Kingfisher 650 ml light brown beer. Not great, but it rekindled memories of the days of toasting miller high life with Kevin after being plunked on. Sentimental value is all that matters when it comes to booze anyway, I feel.
The next day we visited the "second tallest monolithic (aka, carved out of a single rock) statue in the world" located about an hour and a half away from Mysore. It was a jain man. He stood at 17.5 meters tall, blaringly stark naked (schlong included). In a way, it was beautiful yet also disturbing. He was situated on a large hill, only accessible by a 600 step staircase carved into the hill (hills here are mostly giant stones that randomly jut out from the relatively flat horizon). The site was one of the more holy places for those practicing the Jain religion, housing two temples, one of which was this massive naked man's dwelling place. As we walked up the stone mountain, I saw a number of carvings in Karnatak (the language in Karnatak) that had been left there by Jains who had visited the sites in the past. I don't know the exact date it was erected (poor word choice I know), but a guy at the bottom told me in broken english "it's, you know, abuh abuh (the South Indian "um") ooooollllddd." The view was to die for. Again I should probably let pictures do the talking here. I do have a story. When we got to the top, me and Mark climbed a hidden ladder (made of bamboo, so you knew it was illegal) to a landing that showed the backside of the huge statue (the backside was huge, in tail-- see pics when I get them up). Behind the statue was open landscape for miles and miles on end. Pics will elucidate this part of the story. Eventually police guys caught on and started to yell at us to get down. You only live once!
We climbed down the hill, ate lunch, went back to mysore, got more papa razzi attention, and then decided to climb the huge hill just outside Mysore This hill, housed 1000 steps. I got a work out, my limbs were sore, but I did it. At the top, the view was very disappointing: haze from the city made it impossible to see more than a few miles. We did experience social injustice. A young monkey had gotten a hold of a batch of bananas, and was about to eat them when a huge mammoth of a monkey attacked the young one and ate all the bananas IN FRONT OF THE LITTLE GUY. We all stood there cursing the fat monkey for being a horrible monkey being. It was a good bonding experience.
We were free for most of the next day. Me and a couple of people went to the Mysore market. It was huge, colorful, and by god I would argue that you could get any piece of produce you could ever want there (local crops, that is). Much more colorful than the "sunday only market", this market spanned about a km. It was huge. We bought some nuts and fruit for the imminent night train ride (which went well, only problem was that I woke up at 3 and couldn't fall back asleep... sigh...)
That night we packed everything up and set off for Hospet, a small village outside of Hampi (there are no guest houses in Hampi that would house 20 people for a night, so we had to settle for Hospet). After checking into the hotel, we set off for Hampi. Words cannot describe that first trip. Inside of safari-like jeeps (again), we began to see randomly placed hills upon hills of rock jutting over intensely green landscapes (most of which were rice paddie fields/locally run banana farms). Instantly we were surrounded by rock, it looked like the Israeli desert mixed with the view from just outside the Colby library (lovejoy side). Green and brown and orange shot out at you as the sun hit everything in view. It was an attack on the vision, the best one I've ever had. I don't have many pics of the drive there, but I do have a lot of the ruins and the landscape of Hampi (link above). The good news: those are only HALF the pics I have of Hampi.
The first day we explored the ruins. Truly beautiful architecture. The ruins were of the late Vijayanagar empire that ruled until the 16-17th century. (pics will make this clearer). The most cool piece of architecture, because I'm a huge music dork, was of the temple in the middle of one of the compounds in olden Hampi. The temple had these pillars upon pillars, about 5 feet and length, and were on every single structure within the temple. What was so special about these pillars? Well if you had a mallet (or a fist), whenever you hit the pillars, they would produce a different musical note. Yup. *cue Kevin's gaping mouth and "I have to go there"*. As if the landscape didn't give me enough evidence, I was truly in a heaven on earth.
That's all for now. I'll save my epic day in Hampi for my next post. I have to go eat lunch (funny how that always seems to work out... it's like the blogging gods' curse or something). Love and miss you all, keep being beautiful people, and tell me about your whereabouts!
Pakkalam,
Hasan
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
Update Fast Approaching...
... after I finish my summer internship application!
I promise the next update will be a good read-- Touring around Karnataka was so beautiful, and I can remember almost every single moment of it, especially the stories attached. Hopefully I'll be able to get my pics up on here to complement and emphasize the beauty, but don't hold your breath...
Keep being beautiful people--
Love
Hasan
I promise the next update will be a good read-- Touring around Karnataka was so beautiful, and I can remember almost every single moment of it, especially the stories attached. Hopefully I'll be able to get my pics up on here to complement and emphasize the beauty, but don't hold your breath...
Keep being beautiful people--
Love
Hasan
Friday, January 30, 2009
India #3: Pre-Tour
Buongiorno!
I know that this greeting is hardly related to my current location, but I suppose I'm just stickin it to Colby's Italian Department for denying me access to Italian II my freshman spring year.
Eat that Italians (yep, that's a war declaration Sarah).
Wow, that could be easily misconstrued if you put emphasis on "eat" instead of "that"...
Moving on...
So I decided to change my internet scenery: here I am sitting in the upstairs of my host family's house using their internet (I tried to say no, but because the internet cafes are so far away and I don't have to be near the SITA center until 6:45 when I leave for our first "educational tour", I consented...). In about 5 hours (when most of you will wake up and realize that holy shit, it's saturday, and god damn it what the fuck is that white stuff still doing out there... except my family in NC... *wanh wanh*), I'm going to be leaving with the group for our first educational tour. We're going to Mysore, Bangalore, and Hampi, the first two of which are huge huge cities, and the third of which is a very beautiful landscape filled with religious ruins/sacred groves. I'm so excited to not be working (see way below for ongoing rant) for a week, and this trip is gonna be baller-- stay tuned for picturess! (yes, I did just say baller. SHoot me). As such, I'm gonna take this time to be off facebook and other internet activities until I come back-- I'm sure I'll have a lot to tell/post about!
I realized a little late that I left out some details from my first two posts, namely women and restrictions, the ups and downs of Indian eating, and the environment. If you're tired of details and want me to stop being an anthropologist, please skip the first four paragraphs. It's just so hard to ignore these aspects of the society around me, because Indian culture literally hits you in the face every time you walk around (perhaps because of cultural difference), and so a good deal of my experience deals with the onslaught of Indian culture that I face on a day to day basis...
To be a girl here is a struggle. I know that during my first few posts I was all about how the clothes on girls looked so pretty (and that I secretly wanted to wear one...) and how women's roles here were quite different, but recently I've been struck by how mysoginistic (to our standards anyway) and restrictive the Tamil culture is toward girls in general. I could make the tentative argument (hopefully this next sentence will not start an everlong digest argument that ultimately ends up going nowhere with most people involved frustrated that they even got involved, because I mean no harm by implying "some people are more privilaged than others", it's just TRUE... if anyone does that, I will personally shoot you with a nerf gun... twice) that a guy here is much more visibly privilaged than girls. I can pretty do whatever I want (save wear a sari, despite my inner lusts): I can cycle home without fear of harassment, say hi to anyone on the road who desperately wants to hear me speak english coherently (which, for those who know me, is a personal struggle of mine...), or talk to anyone (wearing a salwar kamiz would be a funny occurence, and many people, if they don't have reason enough with my red sox "ramirez" jersey, will stare uncontrollably and then strike up a conversation with a nearby Indian saying "look at that idiot"... except in tamil). While talking to the girls onthe program and overhearing many conversations, I've begun to realize how engendered this place truly is. Girls here face an inordinate amount of harassment, marginalization, and restrictions that makes them uncomfortable. The initial euphoria of wearing a beautiful cotton salwar kemiz with a duputa (a scarf-like thing) has long past, and many of the girls on my program are starting to get irritated at the amount of issues they have to deal with being a girl on a day to day basis put on them. Let me list just a few of them: 1. when an indian guy who is older than 20 approaches an Indian girl in Tamil culture, it is very very weird. However, I hear stories on a day to day basis of older guys asking penetratingly personal questions that makes them uncomfortable or staring at them. Staring here is common, but for most of the girls on our program, if they are not in a group, they are at loss for what to do when this occurs: is he actually interested in me as a foreigner or does he want to get into my salwar? 2. the expectations for girls here are equally as ridiculous. I hear stories of how host families have continually berated girls on our program about being too "manly", both in clothing or in activity. Clothingwise, the Tamil culture views clothing as "restraining a woman from her inherent uncontrollable lusts"; thus, women must always wear their hair up, cover their ankles, and wear a top with sleeves. Anything worn other than this is considered whorish... and are a lot more likely to be harrassed or groped (one girl on our program was publically harassed just beacuse she was wearing capris and a t-shirt... yeah, it's serious). It is equally weird for Tamilians to understand that girls actually like to do more "manly" things like sports. Last weekend when we played cricket, one of the girls that was playing with us told me of the scene that occurred before she left the house: essentially her host mom was under the impression that she wasn't going to go play cricket, but sit and watch and take pictures... when the girl said that she was going to play cricket, the whole family looked at her wide eyed and asked her 2-3 times if she was actually going to play cricket. When the girl eventually got to the cricket pitch, the Indian guys we were playing with asked her if she needed someone to run for her. The list goes on, and on, but I feel like you get the point. every day it is rare to never hear one of the girls on my program frustrated at their more restricted place... and they often make comments at the four guys on the program about how we are so lucky. And to be honest, we are. This may seem to be just another male realizing his higher place in the patriarchal world we live in (I can't seem to word it right, and they way I have it down right now just sounds weird... by I hope you know what I mean)-- the girl as the victim and the male as less than affected... yet the intense visibility of these gender specific restrictions generally has made me think about how privilaged I am as a male on this program...
As I walk down the Madurai streets (and I remember this to be true of Benaras as well), it is weird if I do not see a single piece of trash. If any of you have looked at the pictures I posted on Picasa, there are a couple of pictures of just trash. They aren't of garbage in near or around garbage cans. They're of garbage in river basins, beside houses, lining the roads during cycle rides, and more. And when I say trash, I mean trash- like piles and piles and bags and loads of tiny specks as I ride past on my cycle. I also took one picture of a fire by the side of the road. This wasn't a random fire that college students would jump over after UNC beat Duke in an epic game going into four overtimes for the NCAA championship- it was a fire that was burning excess trash by the side of the road. Trash is omnipresent here, and it is not strange to see a person break open a banana, toss it, and watch as a cow slurps it up and calls it a meal. This doesn't work too well with plastic or material trash in general, which is the majority of the trash that I see. As such, most of the Indian ground is infused with plastics or someone's lunch container from a nearby restaurant. It's weird to see trash so close to you at all times of the day. (I know that around COlby campus I pick up trash whenever I see some and place it in a trash bin... although how elitist is it to do such a thing, when the trash will only end up in someone else's backyard while I enjoy the bermuda grass and greenery (or whitery, depending on the season) of Colby campus. So it goes.) While the Indian government has a trash collecting system, it is much like the jaywalking law: it will probably not be enforced or followed... On top of this, the trash on the side of the road often provides jobs for poorer people (people of the lowest caste), so is it really that bad? THere are a lot of aspects to this "public trash" of public property, and so many questions attached to it as well... What is interesting about this is that you rarely find trash in private places or places covered by a roof... whereas most of the trash from the inside gets deposited right outside the house. I'm actually starting to get used to it. I threw my first piece of trash onto the ground the otherday: a small plastic bag filled with excess banana leafs and newspaper that used to be my lunch. It was hard to do the throwing motion with a plastic bag in hand, knowing I would just be submitting to the Indian man. I admit-- I almost kept it in my pocket and waited till I got back to the SITA center, but then I realized that it would end up somewhere anyhow, so why would such a small piece of trash make a load of difference if it were in front of my house or in some poor person's backyard? (Cue Emma and every other environmental friendly person at Colby's gaping mouth... oh and Dan Band and Eric Maltbie's)
I don't believe I elaborated enough on eating. For one, you eat with your hands (your right hand actually, because your left hand is your ass wiping hand. in general, the right hand is more "auspicious", and if you offer a left hand to greet someone, they might spit in your face... if you're really feeling dirty, you can step on their feet with your left foot and then greet them with your left hand... I haven't tried it out yet, but I'm thinking that you might end up with cow dung as a moustache), except for soup and things like this. Indians actually say that it is MORE sanitary to eat with your hands (after washing them of course), and that it feels much more natural to eat from the hand than from a pronged metal device, and they have a point. Who knows what really is on a spoon before you pick it up in Foss dining hall... and feeling the food before shoving it in your mouth really makes you appreciate it a whole lot more in general.
I think I'm done with the details. NOw on to what I've been up to lately:
Despite the fact that I've only been in Madurai for 19 days, I have become really close with my host family, so close that the other day I said "parawa-yilla" (aka: enh, it's ok) to my amma asking me whether the food was good or not (in Tamil society, if you say that, you generally get a backhand to the face because it is equal to saying "your cooking isn't actually all that great"- and I did, in fact, receive a firm backhand to the back when I said this-- although she knew I was joking; oddly related, my ammaa can throw a frisbee backhand very very far). Me and my ammaa are quite a sarcastic pair, and we definitely have a playful sort of mother-son thing going on (cue maternal mother jealousy). I'm getting on really great with my host siblings. My sister and brother are both warming up to me, and we regularly play small games such as hopscotch or scrabble. I've also taught both of them how to throw a frisbee, and we regularly play in the lot in front of my house after I get home from SITA each day (I have not, however, taught them the denial defence fucking in tents cheer yet, so I can't say that they are real frisbee players yet... that is next on my agenda). Me and my appaa are continuing our more "intellectual" conversations, and I ask him a lot about the current state of politics in Tamil Nadu (the state of India we are in) or what he thinks about a news instance. We both watched the Obama inauguration together, and smiled throughout (we were both quite irritated about the announcers saying this was a huge inauguration just cause it was the FIRST AFRICAN AMERICAN president... and what about him changing politics? I dunno, it was a very racist moment). I love my situation at home right now, and I always am very willing for my privacy to be disturbed by any of them :-).
The other day we went to a religious cave on the outskirts of Madurai. It had been constructed in the 8th century AD by South Indian Hindus in the area (Jain Hill was a very holy place for Jainists). When we originally arrived to the space, I almost thought we were visiting a petting zoo. Surrounding the cave were hundreds (and I mean hundreds) of free-range monkeys. I've never seen something so incredible in my life. For the first 30 minutes of our visit, we were playing with monkeys (in a very distant manner) and watching monkeys play and make use of the human trash in the surrounding area. I have a picture of one of the girls giving a monkey water from her water bottle. Another girl took a video of a monkey chewing gum, and in the middle of him chewing, he grasped the gum and stretched it outside of our mouth, like a 8 year old kid who had just realized that gum was flexible. I had never been so close to a wild animal in my life (well, besides the cows that accompany me to lunch occasionally), and seeing how human these monkeys were was simply amazing. I felt like a chief photographer for National Geographic studying the humanization of animals. It is indescribable in words-- Hopefully I'll get these pictures up soon.
Some other things I have done:
I went downtown to get a USB cord alone and got HOPELESSLY lost. No, I didn't lose my ability to read maps, no I didn't lose my ability to follow directions, Madurai's just freaking confusing (picture downtown boston on steroids. Fucking scary) and the traffic pattern on top of trying to find your way is always really scary. I'm definitely making a facebook album of this experience, so stay tuned-- the pictures will tell what I won't right now!
Last night my ammaa taught me how to drive a motorbike (no mother, I didn't go into the road-- SITA prohibits me from doing so anyway), and I spent close to 30 minutes transporting my thampi (little brother) around the compound. It was really fun, but I can totally understand why I'm being barred from getting a bike: I would get hurt. It's bad enough that I played chicken with an autorickshaw the other day (actually it was more like: I was driving on the LEFT side of the road like any other driver, and this auto rickshaw was coming directly at me from the opposite direction. We then charged at each other until the auto rikshaw got scared and swerved out of the way. I'm thinking about trying it with a bus...), and when you're on a motorbike, you can just lose control in all the divets and swerves you have to do as a small vehicle in a transportation hierarchy based on LARGENESS.
If some of you saw my facebook status the other day, you'll know that i can now officially make dosai- a delicious South Indian pancake. Next to come is sambar, chippati, and hopefully vadai. Yes, I am planning on cooking for you (and yes I will be cooking NON SPICY things as well, despite the fact that everything here can burn your mouth of in t-minus .01 seconds). Yay for cooking!
I suppose that is all, I'm a little perturbed at the amount of work that my classes are giving me-- I mean, I understand I'm in college right now technically, but why give me 80 pages a night to read? Really SITA? Really? Anyway, I"m past it and ready to hit the trains (we're taking an overnight train to Mysore-- so exciting! yes mom, I will wear my money belt and lock all my belongings...) for our tour. I'm also going to be able to buy a beer for the first time (save Canada) as a minor-- it is ok to drink in Bangalore/Mysore-- actually people do it quite regularly. So much for being dry while I'm here.
If you haven't already, check out my photos! I'm not done with them by any means (I have a whole other memory card to add onto it), but hopefully they wil be up after tour!
Love and miss you all, and keep being beautiful.
Poo yete Vaaren.
Hasan
I know that this greeting is hardly related to my current location, but I suppose I'm just stickin it to Colby's Italian Department for denying me access to Italian II my freshman spring year.
Eat that Italians (yep, that's a war declaration Sarah).
Wow, that could be easily misconstrued if you put emphasis on "eat" instead of "that"...
Moving on...
So I decided to change my internet scenery: here I am sitting in the upstairs of my host family's house using their internet (I tried to say no, but because the internet cafes are so far away and I don't have to be near the SITA center until 6:45 when I leave for our first "educational tour", I consented...). In about 5 hours (when most of you will wake up and realize that holy shit, it's saturday, and god damn it what the fuck is that white stuff still doing out there... except my family in NC... *wanh wanh*), I'm going to be leaving with the group for our first educational tour. We're going to Mysore, Bangalore, and Hampi, the first two of which are huge huge cities, and the third of which is a very beautiful landscape filled with religious ruins/sacred groves. I'm so excited to not be working (see way below for ongoing rant) for a week, and this trip is gonna be baller-- stay tuned for picturess! (yes, I did just say baller. SHoot me). As such, I'm gonna take this time to be off facebook and other internet activities until I come back-- I'm sure I'll have a lot to tell/post about!
I realized a little late that I left out some details from my first two posts, namely women and restrictions, the ups and downs of Indian eating, and the environment. If you're tired of details and want me to stop being an anthropologist, please skip the first four paragraphs. It's just so hard to ignore these aspects of the society around me, because Indian culture literally hits you in the face every time you walk around (perhaps because of cultural difference), and so a good deal of my experience deals with the onslaught of Indian culture that I face on a day to day basis...
To be a girl here is a struggle. I know that during my first few posts I was all about how the clothes on girls looked so pretty (and that I secretly wanted to wear one...) and how women's roles here were quite different, but recently I've been struck by how mysoginistic (to our standards anyway) and restrictive the Tamil culture is toward girls in general. I could make the tentative argument (hopefully this next sentence will not start an everlong digest argument that ultimately ends up going nowhere with most people involved frustrated that they even got involved, because I mean no harm by implying "some people are more privilaged than others", it's just TRUE... if anyone does that, I will personally shoot you with a nerf gun... twice) that a guy here is much more visibly privilaged than girls. I can pretty do whatever I want (save wear a sari, despite my inner lusts): I can cycle home without fear of harassment, say hi to anyone on the road who desperately wants to hear me speak english coherently (which, for those who know me, is a personal struggle of mine...), or talk to anyone (wearing a salwar kamiz would be a funny occurence, and many people, if they don't have reason enough with my red sox "ramirez" jersey, will stare uncontrollably and then strike up a conversation with a nearby Indian saying "look at that idiot"... except in tamil). While talking to the girls onthe program and overhearing many conversations, I've begun to realize how engendered this place truly is. Girls here face an inordinate amount of harassment, marginalization, and restrictions that makes them uncomfortable. The initial euphoria of wearing a beautiful cotton salwar kemiz with a duputa (a scarf-like thing) has long past, and many of the girls on my program are starting to get irritated at the amount of issues they have to deal with being a girl on a day to day basis put on them. Let me list just a few of them: 1. when an indian guy who is older than 20 approaches an Indian girl in Tamil culture, it is very very weird. However, I hear stories on a day to day basis of older guys asking penetratingly personal questions that makes them uncomfortable or staring at them. Staring here is common, but for most of the girls on our program, if they are not in a group, they are at loss for what to do when this occurs: is he actually interested in me as a foreigner or does he want to get into my salwar? 2. the expectations for girls here are equally as ridiculous. I hear stories of how host families have continually berated girls on our program about being too "manly", both in clothing or in activity. Clothingwise, the Tamil culture views clothing as "restraining a woman from her inherent uncontrollable lusts"; thus, women must always wear their hair up, cover their ankles, and wear a top with sleeves. Anything worn other than this is considered whorish... and are a lot more likely to be harrassed or groped (one girl on our program was publically harassed just beacuse she was wearing capris and a t-shirt... yeah, it's serious). It is equally weird for Tamilians to understand that girls actually like to do more "manly" things like sports. Last weekend when we played cricket, one of the girls that was playing with us told me of the scene that occurred before she left the house: essentially her host mom was under the impression that she wasn't going to go play cricket, but sit and watch and take pictures... when the girl said that she was going to play cricket, the whole family looked at her wide eyed and asked her 2-3 times if she was actually going to play cricket. When the girl eventually got to the cricket pitch, the Indian guys we were playing with asked her if she needed someone to run for her. The list goes on, and on, but I feel like you get the point. every day it is rare to never hear one of the girls on my program frustrated at their more restricted place... and they often make comments at the four guys on the program about how we are so lucky. And to be honest, we are. This may seem to be just another male realizing his higher place in the patriarchal world we live in (I can't seem to word it right, and they way I have it down right now just sounds weird... by I hope you know what I mean)-- the girl as the victim and the male as less than affected... yet the intense visibility of these gender specific restrictions generally has made me think about how privilaged I am as a male on this program...
As I walk down the Madurai streets (and I remember this to be true of Benaras as well), it is weird if I do not see a single piece of trash. If any of you have looked at the pictures I posted on Picasa, there are a couple of pictures of just trash. They aren't of garbage in near or around garbage cans. They're of garbage in river basins, beside houses, lining the roads during cycle rides, and more. And when I say trash, I mean trash- like piles and piles and bags and loads of tiny specks as I ride past on my cycle. I also took one picture of a fire by the side of the road. This wasn't a random fire that college students would jump over after UNC beat Duke in an epic game going into four overtimes for the NCAA championship- it was a fire that was burning excess trash by the side of the road. Trash is omnipresent here, and it is not strange to see a person break open a banana, toss it, and watch as a cow slurps it up and calls it a meal. This doesn't work too well with plastic or material trash in general, which is the majority of the trash that I see. As such, most of the Indian ground is infused with plastics or someone's lunch container from a nearby restaurant. It's weird to see trash so close to you at all times of the day. (I know that around COlby campus I pick up trash whenever I see some and place it in a trash bin... although how elitist is it to do such a thing, when the trash will only end up in someone else's backyard while I enjoy the bermuda grass and greenery (or whitery, depending on the season) of Colby campus. So it goes.) While the Indian government has a trash collecting system, it is much like the jaywalking law: it will probably not be enforced or followed... On top of this, the trash on the side of the road often provides jobs for poorer people (people of the lowest caste), so is it really that bad? THere are a lot of aspects to this "public trash" of public property, and so many questions attached to it as well... What is interesting about this is that you rarely find trash in private places or places covered by a roof... whereas most of the trash from the inside gets deposited right outside the house. I'm actually starting to get used to it. I threw my first piece of trash onto the ground the otherday: a small plastic bag filled with excess banana leafs and newspaper that used to be my lunch. It was hard to do the throwing motion with a plastic bag in hand, knowing I would just be submitting to the Indian man. I admit-- I almost kept it in my pocket and waited till I got back to the SITA center, but then I realized that it would end up somewhere anyhow, so why would such a small piece of trash make a load of difference if it were in front of my house or in some poor person's backyard? (Cue Emma and every other environmental friendly person at Colby's gaping mouth... oh and Dan Band and Eric Maltbie's)
I don't believe I elaborated enough on eating. For one, you eat with your hands (your right hand actually, because your left hand is your ass wiping hand. in general, the right hand is more "auspicious", and if you offer a left hand to greet someone, they might spit in your face... if you're really feeling dirty, you can step on their feet with your left foot and then greet them with your left hand... I haven't tried it out yet, but I'm thinking that you might end up with cow dung as a moustache), except for soup and things like this. Indians actually say that it is MORE sanitary to eat with your hands (after washing them of course), and that it feels much more natural to eat from the hand than from a pronged metal device, and they have a point. Who knows what really is on a spoon before you pick it up in Foss dining hall... and feeling the food before shoving it in your mouth really makes you appreciate it a whole lot more in general.
I think I'm done with the details. NOw on to what I've been up to lately:
Despite the fact that I've only been in Madurai for 19 days, I have become really close with my host family, so close that the other day I said "parawa-yilla" (aka: enh, it's ok) to my amma asking me whether the food was good or not (in Tamil society, if you say that, you generally get a backhand to the face because it is equal to saying "your cooking isn't actually all that great"- and I did, in fact, receive a firm backhand to the back when I said this-- although she knew I was joking; oddly related, my ammaa can throw a frisbee backhand very very far). Me and my ammaa are quite a sarcastic pair, and we definitely have a playful sort of mother-son thing going on (cue maternal mother jealousy). I'm getting on really great with my host siblings. My sister and brother are both warming up to me, and we regularly play small games such as hopscotch or scrabble. I've also taught both of them how to throw a frisbee, and we regularly play in the lot in front of my house after I get home from SITA each day (I have not, however, taught them the denial defence fucking in tents cheer yet, so I can't say that they are real frisbee players yet... that is next on my agenda). Me and my appaa are continuing our more "intellectual" conversations, and I ask him a lot about the current state of politics in Tamil Nadu (the state of India we are in) or what he thinks about a news instance. We both watched the Obama inauguration together, and smiled throughout (we were both quite irritated about the announcers saying this was a huge inauguration just cause it was the FIRST AFRICAN AMERICAN president... and what about him changing politics? I dunno, it was a very racist moment). I love my situation at home right now, and I always am very willing for my privacy to be disturbed by any of them :-).
The other day we went to a religious cave on the outskirts of Madurai. It had been constructed in the 8th century AD by South Indian Hindus in the area (Jain Hill was a very holy place for Jainists). When we originally arrived to the space, I almost thought we were visiting a petting zoo. Surrounding the cave were hundreds (and I mean hundreds) of free-range monkeys. I've never seen something so incredible in my life. For the first 30 minutes of our visit, we were playing with monkeys (in a very distant manner) and watching monkeys play and make use of the human trash in the surrounding area. I have a picture of one of the girls giving a monkey water from her water bottle. Another girl took a video of a monkey chewing gum, and in the middle of him chewing, he grasped the gum and stretched it outside of our mouth, like a 8 year old kid who had just realized that gum was flexible. I had never been so close to a wild animal in my life (well, besides the cows that accompany me to lunch occasionally), and seeing how human these monkeys were was simply amazing. I felt like a chief photographer for National Geographic studying the humanization of animals. It is indescribable in words-- Hopefully I'll get these pictures up soon.
Some other things I have done:
I went downtown to get a USB cord alone and got HOPELESSLY lost. No, I didn't lose my ability to read maps, no I didn't lose my ability to follow directions, Madurai's just freaking confusing (picture downtown boston on steroids. Fucking scary) and the traffic pattern on top of trying to find your way is always really scary. I'm definitely making a facebook album of this experience, so stay tuned-- the pictures will tell what I won't right now!
Last night my ammaa taught me how to drive a motorbike (no mother, I didn't go into the road-- SITA prohibits me from doing so anyway), and I spent close to 30 minutes transporting my thampi (little brother) around the compound. It was really fun, but I can totally understand why I'm being barred from getting a bike: I would get hurt. It's bad enough that I played chicken with an autorickshaw the other day (actually it was more like: I was driving on the LEFT side of the road like any other driver, and this auto rickshaw was coming directly at me from the opposite direction. We then charged at each other until the auto rikshaw got scared and swerved out of the way. I'm thinking about trying it with a bus...), and when you're on a motorbike, you can just lose control in all the divets and swerves you have to do as a small vehicle in a transportation hierarchy based on LARGENESS.
If some of you saw my facebook status the other day, you'll know that i can now officially make dosai- a delicious South Indian pancake. Next to come is sambar, chippati, and hopefully vadai. Yes, I am planning on cooking for you (and yes I will be cooking NON SPICY things as well, despite the fact that everything here can burn your mouth of in t-minus .01 seconds). Yay for cooking!
I suppose that is all, I'm a little perturbed at the amount of work that my classes are giving me-- I mean, I understand I'm in college right now technically, but why give me 80 pages a night to read? Really SITA? Really? Anyway, I"m past it and ready to hit the trains (we're taking an overnight train to Mysore-- so exciting! yes mom, I will wear my money belt and lock all my belongings...) for our tour. I'm also going to be able to buy a beer for the first time (save Canada) as a minor-- it is ok to drink in Bangalore/Mysore-- actually people do it quite regularly. So much for being dry while I'm here.
If you haven't already, check out my photos! I'm not done with them by any means (I have a whole other memory card to add onto it), but hopefully they wil be up after tour!
Love and miss you all, and keep being beautiful.
Poo yete Vaaren.
Hasan
Subscribe to:
Comments (Atom)