Becoming Indian

With only two weeks left on the Subcontinent, I'm starting to dread our imminent departure. After the shock of the first week, I quickly fell into the rhythms of the Subcontinent: I am a salwar-kameeze-wearing, jasmine-beflowered, toe-ringed, namaste-greeting, puja-attending, tanned begum. Sometimes I don't even need raita to cool down my food. and Kingfisher...Budweiser will never taste the same again. I am still puzzling over much of Indian existence (still I wonder: Why no garbage collection? Lack of traffic laws, however, I have no problem with), but for the most part I feel settled.

We're currently in South India, which is a mellow, friendly, tropical place. After twenty days in the north (I have some great photos of the Kama Stra carvings on the temples at Khajuraho...some prove that horses really can be man's best friend), we returned to Delhi, which was very comforting. After the squalor of Bhopal (remember the Union Carbide disaster? We were in the middle of it) and the historical/religious sites of Orccha, Sanchi, and Khajuraho (all so peaceful and perfect), Delhi was so familiar and (gasp!) calm. I understand now why Sally started us there with a full week of acclimation. After traveling through Madhya Pradesh, though, the Western styles of Delhi were a shock: jeans? sleeveless shirts? Domino's pizza? Where are the saris and paneer?!

After home sweet home (aka Delhi), we flew down to Chennai (Madras), which is a surprisingly trendy--if polluted--city. We shopped ourselves sick in Chennai. After days spent in school watching little kids dance like monkeys and older kids sing about the four things that bind all of humanity (apparently, that's health, hygiene, world peace, and music...I love india), we spent our evenings dining in swank colonial hotels and buying out Fab India. I own more kurtas now than I know what to do with. Unfortunately, we had our first battle with bed bugs. I fell victim pretty early, although I was spared the cockroach sightings of other rooms. At least there were good dosai and coffee downstairs. The one shock of the south is that there's very little alcohol consumption, so after a long day at school, Ben and I would go on Kingfisher hunts through shady Chennai streets. We finally found a bottle shop, but it was a scene: the shop is behind bars, and you slide your money under the bars; the owner then unlocks the cage to come outside with your newspaper-wrapped, brown-bagged beer. And when you unwrap the bottles, a large label reads, "Liquor ruins country, family, life." Still we drank it.

The past week, however, has been really mellow. We were enjoying downtime at the Ideal Beach Resort in Mahabalipuram on the Bay of Bengal. "Relaxation" meant beach-side guitar singing, body surfing in eight-foot breakers, taking a tiny fishing skiff into the sea to swim with jellyfish, reading a lot, swimming laps, watching traditional dance performances, and skinny dipping. Our group was the talk of the resort. Every day, we managed to break at least one rule (who knew you weren't allowed to swim in the ocean at night?).

It's a shock to the system to be back in urban India, sightseeing and being edified by local professors. But we're now on the temple- and literature-focused part of the trip. I finally saw a temple elephant today at Meenakshi Temple; it blessed Rachel. I've been told that I must be an avatar of Meenakshi, what with my name somehow related to her, the lotus flowers in my hair, my "fish-eyed" glasses, and the leaf parrot attached to my bag. Every day it becomes clearer and clearer that I am an Indian deity.

Well, we're off to the Gandhi Museum now. Mostly I am excited for the elephant that lives next door. We definitely haven't seen enough wildlife...monkeys have yet to steal a coconut out of my hand!

Sacred Cows

I've been in India a little over a week, but I'm not sure...we've lost all track of Western time and Western luxuries and Western garbage collection. We've finally left Delhi, and have now ventured into what Sally, our group leader, calls "down home" India: After a quick stay in Agra to see the Taj Mahal, we're now in Bhopal, the capital of Madhya Pradesh. There are no tourists, no white people, no blondes. I'm getting a lot of stares. Even in agra, perhaps the most visited city in India, Indian families were coming up wanting to take their picture with me. One family even did a series of photos of each family member and me. Sally thought it was the American t-shirt; I think it's my movie star sunglasses. Surely I must be Julia Roberts?!

We were actually quite pampered in Delhi and Agra, and that became shockingly clear when we arrived here in Bhopal. Or hotel is a "middle class option," which means dirt roads, roaches, and a shower that pours directly onto the toilet. Te city itself (which is about 1.2 million inhabitants) was a shocker from the train station. There have been beggers everywhere, but here a boy with leprosy and therefore no feet hobbled on his arms after us, begging for chapati. There was more garbage here than in Old Delhi, and the sacred cows have increased exponentially. Here, herds of cattle lounge in the middle of the city's busiest street. We all had a little bit of shellshock upon our arrival, particularly when Sally urged the women to wear, if not our whole salwar kameeze, at least our dupatta, a shawl/scarf you wear to cover your breasts.

Surprisingly, though, our first day here was pleasant. We visited a local mosque where the kids surreptiously waved and giggled at me, and then finally worked up the nerve to say hi. Most only speak Urdu, but one group of girls knew a little bit of English and were eager to chat with me. It was interesting to see them relax a little bit with me, but once the muezzin started his call to prayer, they quickly covered their heads and darted away. We're getting a lot of quizzical looks on this trip. I don't mind the kids and the women so much, as they're clearly curious and not necessarily judgemental. But the men ogle and leer. And it's very uncomfortable. You feel helpless...at least at home if someone's really harassing you, you can say something, but here...I'm a Western woman. Clearly I'm meant to be ogled.

What else? In Delhi, I fell down the stairs and ended up having to go to an Indian doctor for an x-ray. They give you no protective covering, which was a little frightening. Nothing was broken, but the doctor said I either sprained my foot (?!) or pulled a tendon...Once he determined no break, he had no interest in a diagnosis. So I spent one monsoony day bedridden while my fellow travelers traipsed off to the crafts museum. I did join them for the walking tour of Delhi, although I got carted around in a bicycle rickshaw cum chariot like a princess. I was quite the spectacle. We also have had our share of the monsoon, which pours for several hours, turning every street into a river. But then an hour after it ends, everything goes away and Delhi is turned into a green paradise. The parrots even come out!

Overall, I'm still overwhelmed. I'm not really sure what to do with my reactions and the facts of existence here. India is poor. It's dirty, it's chaotic, it's reckless, it's fanatic. But clearly it's so much more than that. There's more than the surface level of grime and poverty, and we're slowly starting to dig deeper. I'm astounded, but I'm also amazed. India is the largest democratic experiment in the world! More people vote in Uttar Pradesh, one of the states, than in the entire United States! And the literature and the art and the devotion and the vibrant clothes. There are so many appealing things here. But my reaction is still puzzled. On the one hand, I feel lucky for the fact of being born in the U.S....What priveleges, what wealth I am granted simply because of my birthplace! But are those priveleges and that wealth at the expense of the rest of the world? I suppose it's white guilt on a grander scale. Karen, my current roomate on the trip, said she copes with everything by thinking, "This is reality for most of the world. And in the blink of an eye, I could be begging in the street." But I don't necessarily buy that. Life may get rough, but we all have people to fall back on. Unless disasters befall every single person we know and love, we'll always have a support network. I'll never have to live like this. And knowing that is the most puzzling part. What does that mean?

I'm off to go chew some pan (mmm...betel nut). Tomorrow we head to Sanchi, an ancient Buddhist stupa, to be enlightened.

Namaste

So I have safely--if sweatily--been in India for four days now, and I am overwhelmed.

Of course, there is the heat. Or rather the humidity. Our arrival brought the monsoons, which are refreshing once they fall, but for the day-long build-up, it is sweltering. I try not to think about it too much (or the multiple ice cold showers I crave, but alas, Delhi is in a severe water crisis), but it definitely defines our experience. What's remarkable is that Delhites don't sweat. Ever. Well, that's not true. Today was record humidity, and a Kashmiri woman who runs a school we visited was whining about the heat. But I'm not sure she counts...after all, she's from the Himalayas. This is all brutal to her.

Aside from weather, I'm trying to soak up all I can, preferably from the back of a rickshaw where the breeze hits you and you're side-by-side with sidewalk Delhi. We are staying in a posh subdivision of New Delhi. There are security guards, garbage collection, and running water. We're a short walk from Khan Market where we can buy all the fancy salwar kameezes and gourmet coffee we want, and Lodi Gardens, an elaborate Muslim park where locals go to practice yoga and laugh therapy at daybreak. And if you look closely, parrots criss-cross the sky.

I'm finding that the stereotypes of India--especially Delhi--are here somewhere, but this place is so much more than that. Yes, there are sacred cows roaming the streets and children beg for chapati and garbage piles up in empty lots. But there are also frangipani trees making the city smell beautiful, offerings for the nightly puja at temple being sold on the street, and locals who want so desperately for you to see that, beneath the undeniably grubby (and I'm being euphemistic) exterior, Delhi is so much more. As teachers here on a fulbright, we're privy to cultured, wealthy Delhi...excellent meals (for $2!), dance performances, lectures by professors. But today we did venture into a Bengali slum to visit a non-profit school. A remarkable place that I'm still processing, it's name, "Katha Kazhana," apparently means something like hidden garden or hidden treasure, and it truly is. I can't describe the streets outside of this school...the Cape Flats and Alexandra Township in South Africa don't even compare. But in the midst of squalor, this school is a glimmer of hope. Most of the kids only speak Hindi and Bangla, so we didn't get to interact much with them, but the teachers left quite an impression. Once I process the day, I'll write more about it.

In the first few days here, I keep coming back to one of the first lines of Midnight's Children, when Saleem insists that he must quickly tell his story--so clearly an allegory for post-independence India--to fight the impending meaningless. He must make meaning out of the experiment that is his life, and the experiment that is democratic India. The ubuntu and the hope that struck me so in South Africa is not as readily accessible here. As Neeti, one of our companions here in Delhi said, "India needs another Gandhi...we need a miracle."

Ubuntu

Our last day in Cape Town and I’m left noticing all the things I will miss about this city, this country, this experience: the smells of African spices; the musical welcomes everywhere we go; all of the South African children who are eager to talk to and hug us; finding an excuse to say “yebo” as much as possible each day; the animals who pop up in unexpected places (cows wandering the townships, geckos falling on me in the shower, wildebeest roaming a field in the middle of Cape Town); Table Mountain magnificently orienting us to infinite bays and neighborhoods; our own students finding song mid-way through the trip and then peppering each day with selections from The Lion King and The Prince of BelAir. Just about the only thing I won’t miss is pap, a cornmeal mush that’s been served to us a few too many times.

I had grand plans of spending my last half-day in South Africa doing something new and exciting (abseiling down Table Mountain? visiting the District Six museum? running along the beach to Clifton?), but Hammer and I have succumbed to the V&A Waterfront, a megaplex of malls and restaurants lining Cape Town’s working harbor. We are spending our last few hours in a harried attempt to finish some shopping (gifts to bring home! thank you cards for Timothy and Paul! dried guava for the plane ride!)…as if we haven’t bought enough already. I’ve been amazed throughout the trip that we can go from experiences like Mama Amelia’s—where Anathi (one of the 94 kids living at Sakhumzi) informed me, “We don’t have our own things; we share everything. I’ve never even owned my own watch or shoes”—to dropping hundreds of dollars at markets and upscale hotels. It’s not that I feel guilty for our sometimes extravagance (although our consumerism definitely marks us as Americans…Timothy even remarked at some point, “Oh man, you lot can shop!”), but I guess I’m still trying to figure out what our being here has done, for us as well as the people we’ve met and visited. Opening our eyes has been thrown around a lot, but did we really need to come halfway around the world to open our eyes to inequality and poverty and struggle? I know I didn’t…these are things I’m all too aware of at home. And are our school supplies really going to have a huge effect on the lives of the people we met? The kids at Bongani can color pictures now, but in the grand scheme of things…What have we really accomplished by being here? How have we changed? More importantly, what have we learned?

This is the lesson that I’ll take home with me: that in the face of even the most wretched living conditions or unjust political oppression, it is possible—no, necessary—to hope. And that although the roof may be leaking and shoes may be worn out (or worse: epidemics may be encroaching and jobs may be missing), we can still lead happy and meaningful lives, lives worth living. And if we hope for more, and if we act on that hope, things just might change. 1994 taught South Africa just that: hope and faith changed their world. South Africa definitely still has its share of political and economic issues to address (the shanties of Kayelitsha and the ravage of AIDS attest to that), but what is so remarkable is that South Africans remain hopeful and optimistic. Maybe it’s ubuntu, the Zulu idea that “I exist because you exist,” the idea that we are in this together and we can make it if we work together. Or maybe it’s the sense that the impossible has already happened—apartheid ended!—and that the world can only continue to get better (I’m still astounded by the minister at St. Paul’s in Soweto, who declared in his sermon, “In 1994, God kept his promise to us, to Soweto”). Or maybe it’s South Africa itself: when you are blessed with a home as geographically stunning and vibrant as southern Africa, how can you not believe that the life of humans must someday equal the beauty of the landscape? Or maybe it’s simply what Mama Amelia knows and shares with her 94 children at Sakhumzi: that it is hope, love, and joy that make life worth living.

It is not my gifts and purchases—not even my beautiful Xhosa skirt with the bustle—that are the important things I’m bringing home from South Africa. In fact, they have nothing to do with the South Africa I’m falling in love with. In a week, a year, or even when I’m eighty, this is what I’ll remember about these past two weeks: Louis’s smile when he talks about his vision for South Africa’s future. Anathi’s genuine tenderness for me, a complete stranger. The joyful rhythms of the drum song at the Africa Café. Timothy’s tears when hearing the new South African national anthem in a school for the first time (“When I was in school, we used to lower the flag to the floor and have a moment of silence,” he said). The exuberant song we received as a welcome at St. Paul’s. Hammer’s wonder at the marvels of each day. And this is the image that will stay with me: Standing at the Cape of Good Hope with my thirteen other LFA travelers and feeling a bit prophetic—knowing the future in store for South Africa when Diaz stumbled upon this end of the world in 1488 and marveling at the miraculous nation that managed to emerge half a century later. Of course the Cape of Storms became the Cape of Good Hope, and of course it’s hope I’m taking home with me…you can’t leave this place with anything else.