The wheel has left the car: Picture extravaganza to make up for the lack of post!

Said in calm, heavily-accented English, it was the understatement of the century. About an hour into our class’ journey to the Shakavati region, we saw a wheel (axel and all) go careening past our own car. As the car ahead of us full of MSID (my program) students shot sparks and swerved to the side of the road to avoid flipping over, my teacher, seemingly unaffected by the immense possibility of the car actually flipping over, told us “the wheel has left the car”. If anything, this action sums up Indian driving completely. After pulling over, realizing people from the various roadside stands had already ran off with the tire, we embarked on a journey to acquire a replacement from an ironically placed tire stand 100 feet away. A large group of “able” village people ran over to offer their two cents in hopes for money in return and we were able to install a new tire, take the a lug nut from each of the remaining tires to replace the ones missing from the stolen tire, and head on our merry way within a half hour.

This last week was spent mostly away from my home in Jaipur, and so I really really apologize for my lack of posts (and also for my pathetic venting about the dog last week, but it was quite traumatic for me). My internet connection was also messed up, making it impossible to log onto the internet at all, but again, not really much of an excuse. You all deserve a little more attention! Definitely! If there are ever seemingly long pauses between the posts again, my family and probably Nathan are in “the know” so ask them for some info about my wanderings. But back to the stories… lots to tell this week!

For those of you following at home, you may now cross off tiger safari from the India Bingo Game. This past weekend was a whirlwind of oddity. Everything that happened seemed to occur in a way completely in opposition to what we had originally planned, yet it was a weekend I will never forget. Saturday morning, four other students and I boarded a rickshaw headed towards the Jaipur train station in pursuit of going on a Tiger safari. Yes, five students in the back of a very small rickshaw does in fact work; however, it means hanging your feet out the back window while clinging to the ceiling. A month ago, I probably would have considered other modes of transportation before jumping into the back of a speeding, mini rickshaw driving with compressed natural gas in a tank located below my seat, yet India has definitely lowered my standards of safety (perhaps not for the better).

I have a sweet video of this ride; however, in the two hours it has taken me to publish this post, it still hasn't finished uploading. Perhaps later, with faster internet!

Indian trains are a mess. Even with my medium ability to understand and speak Hindi, we still stood in 3 wrong lines, each one instructing us to go to a different place which then proceeded to tell us once again we were in the wrong place. The concept of line, much like the concept of traffic laws, seems to be nonexistent in India. As we neared the front of the “line”, a massive mob would surround us, cut us off, and then proceed to buy tickets before us. I would never picture tiny old women in bright blue saris to elbow like that, but my goodness, I still today, a week later, have a bruise on my hip from an 80 year old woman in a sari. Indian women are tough cookies (or should I say biscuits, yes yes, biscuits). In the end, we learned to form a half circle around the person purchasing tickets by standing shoulder to shoulder and sticking our elbows back behind us. Besides the lack of lines and traffic laws, India is also not very clear with directions. The tickets told us when the train would depart, however failed to mention the important detail of which platform it would be departing from. Jaipur, being the capitol of Rajasthan, has one of the largest stations so we wandered about, asking random people and receiving very different information. Our teachers told us the first day that whenever you ask for directions, you must ask at least four people before proceeding as Indians will always give an answer, even if it is wrong. After finding the platform, we learned another lesson about Indian trains: they are late, very very late.


Although our train was supposed to depart at 10 am, it didn’t arrive in Jaipur until 1:00. We for sure thought we had missed the train or that we were in the wrong place. People around us kept insuring us that we were correct and so we sat on the floor of the station and ate biscuits. Once the train did arrive, I again witnessed a fury of men and women in traditional dress shoving, pulling, throwing, and kicking their way onto the general admission train cars. These are a free for all, first come first serve style of riding and they do get packed. I found a place next to a nice cage of chickens, below two men sitting on top of the overhead luggage rack. Trains are busy, loud, and completely enthralling. I am a lover of people watching and this is 100 times better than any airplane. People bond on trains over a communal feeling of annoyance at various little things. Simple smiles and looks of understanding do wonders for making you feel part of something more than just a person chilling next to a chicken. At every stop, new people pile on, including various sellers of fruit, newspapers, nuts, and a tomato/onion/cilantro/lentil salad like thing that really looked amazing…. And a few people vacate. (sorry, but no pictures of the chickens. If I would have stood up to get my camera, I would have lost my chiken seat. Can't have that now after we bonded so well!)

After a 3 hour train ride (which was definitely long enough for me), we arrived in the little town of Sawai Modphur which is the closet city to Rathambore national park. Because of the late train, we missed the afternoon safari and had to push our plans back to the morning. The guesthouse we found in our Lonely Planet guide seemed to exist in a vortex which took us an hour to find then was completely empty. After knocking on the door for a while and then almost giving up, a little smiling adorable old man in a plaid shirt came running out to greet us saying he was making us chai. Apparently no one had stayed in the guesthouse for the past 4 months and therefore he was quite excited to see us. Looking back on this, this could have been the beginning of an awesome yet cheesy horror film, but we were excited to be there and ignored the oddness of the situation.

Sawai Modhpur Temple

Street Vendors, Check out those movie posters!

Once settled in, we took a rickshaw out to where the park entrance was to scope it out for the next morning and to pick up some food. After dropping us off 5 km outside of Sawai Modphur and leaving, we realized that he was probably the only rickshaw we would see that night and we were quite a distance outside of the town. As it grew darker, we gave up looking for a rickshaw and started to walk back to the town. We had a guy with us so it wasn’t just a group of girls. Even then, it was probably not the best of situations. It was still kind of empowering, and the sunset was gorgeous. After 2 km or so, a massive tractor pulling an empty hay truck pulled over and asked us if we wanted a ride. Again, sticking with the whole bad horror movie theme, we thought what the heck, we don’t want to walk anymore and hopped into the back of the trailer. We bounced our way across the countryside, passing camel carts and motorcycles. He pulled over just outside of the city and we jumped off, thanked him, and walked the rest of the way. It was really one of those “only in India” moments and I completely loved it.

Dinner!

During dinner, we had found out that you could book Tiger safaris online before going into the park to make sure you would have a spot. We hurried to an internet café and found out all the safaris were totally booked. Really bummed out, we learned further that normally two jeeps are kept open for people to book the day of, you just have to get to the park right when it opens to reserve them. With some glimmer of hope, we walked back home, stopping along the way for a snack at a road side stall of fried green chilies and mango juice, watched part of a bollywood with a bunch of truckers while sitting in plastic folding chairs by the side of the road, and chilled on the roof of the guest house talking until late into the evening. Being somewhat of a morning person, I volunteered to wake up crazy early and Rachael and I left our hotel at 4:15 in the morning to walk to the train station to find a rickshaw driver, wake him from his slumber, and drive out to Rathambore. The gates open at 5am and we were the first ones in line. By the time 5am struck, there was a good sized mob of tourists and hotel workers purchasing tickets for their clients vying for the remaining two jeeps. Right at 5am, a man walked over and opened the gate. The second it was opened just barely enough, the mob of people started sprinting. Not knowing where we were going, we took off running and miraculously ended up second in a line of 30 or so people. The people ahead of us had been on a safari the morning prior and give us a heads up that we needed to fill out consent forms before they would even sell us tickets. I held our place in line and Rachael picked up the forms. We had everyone’s passports, but for the forms we had to make up each person’s parents’ names, addresses, and then sign saying they wouldn’t sue if they got eaten by a tiger or something. Completely illegally, we forged everything and waiting anxiously to see if we would get one of the coveted spots. In the end, our mad sprinting and early bird rising paid off and we got 5 of the 12 total spots available for the day.

Rathambore is beyond description. I rode in the back of an open top jeep, hair flying, weaving amongst mountains, streams, waterfalls, forest, and jungle. The immense beauty and complete peace is something I will hopefully be able to hold on to and return to when times are crazy. I really cannot do it justice with my words, nor can the millions of pictures I took before giving up to soak up the goodness around me.

Although our guide stopped for 10 minutes or so in multiple spots after hearing the panic calls of monkeys and watching herds of deer flee from some apparent danger, we were unable to see an actual tiger. We did, however, see numerous deer, gorgeous birds, mongoose, and other small animals. Even without the tiger, the scenery and exhilaration alone experienced while riding in the back of a jeep during the early morning sunrise is worth hundreds of times more than admission (and India is cheap remember. For a private jeep safari through the park for four hours, we each paid 605 rupees or about $12.50 in US currency. Yes, be jealous all those who went to London or France!).

We saw mountains, hills, desert, everything!

Enjoying the peace

King Fisher

That little hump is an owl!

We returned on Sunday night by way of an even more packed train than before and went to normal classes on Monday and Tuesday. Wednesday through Friday our class journeyed up to the Shakavati region to visit an NGO, Non-Governmental Organization, that works on organic farming methods at the village level as well as working with women crafters to manage small micro-businesses which sell crafts to the government run emporiums.

Indian Traffic Jam!

Traffic in Indian is a crazy mix of every mode of transportation possible (car, cycle, rickshaw, camel, donkey...)

Oh yes, and sheep!

We toured an agricultural research center which specializes in organic methods for pesticides and fertilizers. One of the many brews being tested right now is a combination of cow urine, water, bark from a particular tree and leaves from a different one. For fertilizers, they are incorporating vermin-composting (with worms) into the normal lives of the village farmers. The Rajasthan government will pay for 75% of the costs of a vermin-compost system for any village farmer as it reduces the need for harsh chemicals as well as increasing the output of crops.

Cow Urine Pesticides

Solar drying systems for tomatos (delicious!)

Another system being used in the regions is a type of watering system known as Boond-Boond or a drip irrigation system. Because of its location in the desert, Rajasthan farmers have trouble with extreme water shortages and fast evaporation. To resolve this, they burry below the ground before putting in their crops a small thin tube with holes in it which is hooked up to a water pump. This system delivers water directly to the roots of the plants without the excess water being evaporated off so in the end, it uses significantly less water. We also visited both a small and “large” (large for India, small for the United States) farm that utilize various things being researched at the station. Both farmers were so proud and overly excited to show us everything.

I love these things so much.

Papaya tree

Mustard

One very proud farmer in his field

The area is also quite famous for its painted Havelis, or mansions. About 120 years ago, people started to paint the outside of their houses to show off their wealth. Once one person started to paint, everyone sought to outdo their neighbor. This led to the creation of an entire city filled with extravagantly painted mansions. Completely wonderful.

The car ride back home was uneventful (no tires vacating the cars) and I’m currently sitting in the dinning room with my host brother Akshay, working on homework. Tomorrow night, Saturday, I will be dressing in my finest, getting Henna painted all over myself, and head off to a wedding with my host family. There will definitely be immense picture taking!

One last Bingo check off before I sign off: get picture publish in an Indian newspaper. Yes, in all its glory, Ben and I had our picture in the Daily News of Jaipur taken during our visit to the Jaipur foot factory. Again, yes you did read that correctly. Picture in newspaper and Jaipur foot factory; weird, I know. Our class took a field trip last Friday to a place where they make artificial feet for people who lack a foot or feet completely free of cost. Anyone can come from anywhere in India and they are fitted with a new foot that matches their skin color and is shaped just for them within a few hours. The NGO’s goal is for the person to be up and walking before the end of the day. The organization pays for their stay in Jaipur and feeds them, as well as giving them a foot and paying for their return trip back to wherever they came from. Anyways, there just happened to be a photographer for the newspaper in the vicinity who then proceeded to make up an “interview” with a fictional girl by the name of Julia who is definitely not a part of my study abroad program and place it under my picture claiming that “Indians work very hard”. India is so weird.

Thanks again for everything, especially your patience with my lack of blogging! India is so intense yet utterly wonderful and I want so badly to share it with you all. I will talk to you soon!

PS. I’m currently experiencing my first Indian rainstorm. So pretty.

Blood

Today was hard. I saw a dog get hit by a car on the way home from school. She was carrying a puppy in her mouth and a car smashed into her, crushing the puppy and smashing the side of the mother’s head. I couldn’t do anything but watch in horror. The puppy was completely crushed beneath the wheels of the car and I can only hope that it was instant. The mother bled profusely out her jaw line as the bottom of her jaw was just hanging by a tiny piece of ligament or something and her rib cage was obviously smashed inwards. She stumbled toward me in total shock as I stood there completely helpless. I have blood on my shoes. I watched her die. She didn’t look at peace; she didn’t have the inner light that I always assumed would comfort in the last few seconds of life. I have her blood on my shoes. She stared at me with complete terror as I tried to reach out in any way possible to comfort her while her blood flowed down the murky stream of water that collects near the edge of the roads. After she died, a shop owner dragged her toward the street dumpster across the way to be discarded with the left over vegetable scraps and plastic bags. The puppy continued to be run over until its body was almost one with the dirt road when I checked from my balcony 10 minutes ago. I can’t stop crying. I have something that, less than 24 hours ago, supplied the life force to a breathing creature on my shoes. She was terrified and I couldn’t do anything except stare back.

Day of Firsts (Mega Pictures For Your Pleasure!!)

Did you know that India has marching bands? I had no idea until about 5 minutes ago when a marching band (which happened to include all the normal instruments drums, trumpets, saxophones, plus a few random extras… who the heck wants to march with a bassoon?) followed by 20 horses decked out in gold and silver paraded past my balcony. With every block they stumbled amongst the cow dung and motorcycles as they journeyed away from the Ganesh temple, they were swarmed by any onlooker who felt it a good day to be in a parade. Women clothed in yellow and blue saris chatted joyfully while munching on fried bananas and fresh papaya as they picked their way down the street. Near the end, desperate children ran behind, trying to catch up as they pulled their goat or baby brother or kite behind them. Of course I set down my book I had been reading on the balcony and ran to grab my camera, but in the heat of the moment it was not to be found and instead I just sat and soaked up the colorful display of immense happiness. Next time I will have the camera. Trust me, this is India, there will definitely be a next time!

While chopping a fresh bunch of cilantro purchased from the greenery vender who greets me every morning on my way to class, my host mom informed me that today (January 31^st) is Basunt Panchmi, or the first day of spring. Yes you did hear that right, while you are enduring the wonders of Midwestern winters, we are currently experiencing a “cold front” and the first day of spring. New fruit is daily coming into season and I’m presented with a new delight every morning: mango, papaya, fresh grapes, bananas, oranges…wedding season is in high gear, and clear blue skies have calmly situated themselves above the chaos of Jaipur. Basunt Panchmi is associated with the Goddess Saraswati who rides a swan, plays sitar, watches over the world of education, and just happens to enjoy the color yellow. Therefore, today we wear yellow, we eat yellow foods, and think in the mindset of yellow in order to receive blessings from her (you pray to her for help with classes, she helps write music and is a lover of songs, and all around a pretty darn cool lady if you ask me).

Even after studying Hinduism for the past few years, it still amazes me how personally, and even physically, devoted people are to their deities. Religion is completely enveloped in life in the household that I’m a part of. They have a small house God who is daily awoken from his slumber, bathed, fed, given flowers and inscents, and in return he blesses and gives good fortune. Besides the wonderful fruit, I’m greeted in the morning with a small burning candle our host mother has presented to the God and then proceeds to take some of the light symbolically into her hand and pass it over my head in order to bless me and give me good fortunes for the day. Both our host mom and dad walk daily down the street to the Ganesh temple where they take pooja (presenting Ganesh with a small token of affection or merely praying or meditating in his presence) and received Prasad, or holy food as I’ve spoken about before, in return. After asking Ganesh to remove their obstacles (which is one of the things associated with the elephant headed God Ganesh who happens to love eating butter and is friends with a little mouse) they proceed down to another temple to again do pooja and receive Prasad. Daily they bring home multiple sickly sweet, overly rich, blessed pieces of candy and cookies which I feel awkward not eating as it would be definitely wrong to throw out the blessed food with the trash which then gets brought out to feed the pigs or cows living across the street. However, tucking on a few extra pounds around the waist at the cost of pleasing an elephant headed God is something I’m not quite sure I should endure. (I might end up like these monster pigs. They're HUGE. This picture doesn't do them justice because I didn't want to get closer otherwise they snort and run at you. I'm completely scared of the evil crazed pigs)

Speaking of food, this blog entry was interrupted by calls for a late lunch of “Subhji”, which is an ambiguous name for any mixed cooked vegetable, bread, cilantro, lemons, and papaya. Today’s Subji consisted of every vegetable our mother could get her hands on: cauliflower, cabbage, tomatoes, carrots, onions, ginger, and of course mountains of spices. After roughly chopping everything, she put the veggies in a pressure cooker and cooked it until it was mushy but still a little solid, added fresh shelled peas, a few more spices, and then served it to us in little metal bowls. (interjection here again, my little host sister wanted to see what I was doing and informed me the Subhji we had today was in fact named Pavbhaji but when spoken of is still known as Subhji). On top of the Subhji you sprinkle fresh cilantro and squeeze a little lemon juice. Amazing! Our host mom is adorable and a wonderful cook.

Today was a day of firsts for me. Besides the whole marching band/first day of spring extravaganza of the morning, I went for a walk by myself, wore my first headscarf and set of Indian clothes that I had tailored for me, rode in my first cycle rickshaw, visited the old city for the first time, got stopped for the first time in my life by 5 monkeys crossing the road, and took my first picture of a camel! A very successful day all around if you ask me. Even while wearing the traditional dress of India, my almost florescent white skin brought on by months of winter hibernation plus my blondness seems to still draw attention. I’ve come to accept it; however, it’s still unnerving to get singled out by men, grabbed at, followed by grown men and homeless children alike (perhaps that says something about Indian men here….) whenever I step outside my door. Wearing the headscarf today really helped lessen the attention drawn to me as they had to look really closely before realizing I was different, which I think most people don’t take the time to while strolling down the street. Although it still happened a few times. The head scarf also perpetuated the belief within my host family that I’m engaged to Nathan as only people engaged or married within the Hindu faith wear their heads covered so as to not draw attention to themselves. Can’t win can I?

Another first, yesterday was our first Friday field trip through school. Yes yes, we get to take field trips like back in elementary school! We took two bus/van things out to a little city within the county of Jaipur known as Sanganer which is famous as a handicraft center in Rajasthan. They make blue pottery, handmade paper, and block printed textiles following the same traditional ways of production that have been passed down for over 700 years. First we went inside the paper making factory. The paper starts out as left over scraps of cloth from tailors, clothing production, and other random odds and ends. It is cleaned and the color removed. Then, using natural dyes, the cloth is boiled with some enzymes to help break it down. The pulp is then passed through a screen where various color is added and flecks of dried flowers, gold strings, bits of other colored paper, or anything one could ever want is hand mixed in as the water is pressed out. It is then run through a little hand crank machine that flattens the paper piece by piece, dried further, and then hand cut and made into cards, stationary, boxes, journals, notebooks…. It’s much like what is done at the many paper mills in Wisconsin only on a much more micro scale. Everything is done by hand. The pulp is walked from one bin to the next. Two men lift up the screen by hand and press out the water. Women and men sit on the ground cutting each piece to fill orders that get shipped all over the world. Another difference is the use of completely natural dyes. I have no idea how they get such vibrant colors but they showed us different spices, flowers, minerals, and seeds that in combination somehow result beautiful reds, turquoise, greens, purples, yellows and so on. They really do strive to keep things really ecologically sensitive by using recycled products, natural dyes, and reusing their water which I always think is really interesting to hear about it. Sorry, but they wouldn’t let us take pictures inside the factory.

The next stop was at the blue pottery shop. The method is loosely based around Persian pottery and isn’t made on a wheel. Instead, ground up quartz, obsidian, a couple gum pastes from various trees, and a few other minerals are blended together with water to make a dough that feels much like bread dough after it’s risen for some time. Men push the dough into various molds where it is baked, cooled, sanded, hand painted, and re-baked before it is finished. It’s completely gorgeous. They make everything from pots and vases to turtle shaped candle holders, earrings, ashtrays, and pulls for fans.

The same family that owns the small pottery shop (and it has for the past 200 years) also owns and runs the block printing textile shop. Various states around India are famous for different types of textiles, but Rajasthan is known for its block printing. You have maybe seen a screen printed version of this back in the states as it is currently “all the rage” with the bohemian fashion hipsters but this is amazingly more beautiful. A small elderly man gave us a demonstration as he worked to finish a table cloth that would take him at least 9 more hours before completion. Each block is hand carved, and dipped in ink before every application. The man places it on the fabric and strikes it with the back of his hand, re-dips it in the ink, places it on the fabric and repeats over and over again. We were told that the art is in the placement and we were able to each hit the block to make a print. After the first layer of black is applied, a second layer of a different color is stamped on, and then another and another. Some pieces require 5 or more applications of color. The factory specializes in the base color for the fabric. The cloth for each piece starts out as white, but then they grind up old used horse shoes into a powder and use it to dye the fabric a warm yellowy color. Each color used for printing, much like the dyes for the paper, comes from herbs, flowers, and spices. After all the work put into each piece, they still only sell for around 500 rupees or about $10 for a table cloth or bed covering. I’m torn in that respect as there is so much effort and history woven into each textile but it still goes for mere pennies compared with similar efforts in America.

I think that’s enough of my silly rantings for a while. I’m going to do a “day in the life of Krista” sometime this week where I’ll take a bunch of pictures documenting what my day really does look like. I hope you’re enjoying the cold because I kind of do miss the snow a little…. I miss you all so much! Thank you for being wonderful.

Much love!!

Loose Motions

I am overwhelmed, but probably in a good way. Probably being the key word. Jaipur is everything wonderful and even more than I had ever thought it would be. Everything I see feels so enveloped in some mystical story tale that you read about as a child. The roads are very narrow and twist amongst small shops which sell only jootis (pointed toed camel shoes) or puppets or large piles of spices or umbrellas or….. There are men in brightly colored turbans pushing carts loaded with vibrantly purple eggplants, piles of cauliflower, and crunchy cabbage. Others sit with small scales weighing out Indian street snacks or hawking fruit or chai. The city is alive in everyway possible. You can’t look anywhere without seeing someone doing something that involves some random thing that happens to be colored the most brilliant hue you’ve ever seen. Cows rule the road and decide to sprawl out wherever they haphazardly see fit. Painted camels bob their way around the roundabouts pulling carts piled high with fabric (I swear that camels have the best grins for an animal I’ve ever seen. They remind me of some completely humble, lovably awkward person out for a stroll who happens to be having the best day of their life. I know camels are supposedly stubborn and spit like there is no tomorrow, but all the ones I’ve seen are happy beyond belief. I love them!). There are swaying elephants with turbine clad drivers, wild pigs running in packs, stray dogs, cats, and oodles of curious monkeys strolling across rooftops.

My emotions this first week have been up and down, very high and very low, but sometimes it seems like I feel anything and everything all at once. We moved in with our host families last Friday afternoon. I live in the second story of a white apartment less than a block away from five different Hindu temples. My host family is a very modest middle class family of four. The father works selling furniture and the mom stays at home; however, has just recently finished her doctorate in Yoga studies so she is one of the leaders at a local Yoga center. We have two younger siblings, Akshay and Akshara. Akshay (male) is 16 and Aksara (girl) is 14. They are both amazingly bright children and understand and communicate in both English and Hindi almost fluently which is nice when the language barrier grows a little too much. Our Uncle-ji (father) speaks quite a lot of English but our mommi-ji (mother) only understands the important words and stumbles at other times. Shiveta (my roomie from Macalester college in Minnesota who is Punjabi but born and raised in the United States) and I share a room on the end of the apartment. It has a little balcony that over looks the dirt road outside our house. We can see the Moti Doongari fort and the tops of temples from the balcony as well as spy at least six cows at all times.

View from our balcony. Mooti Doongri fort is on the hill, the large white pointed building is the Ganesh Temple.

The small herd of cows when looking the other way off of the balcony

Beds in India are very hard, but that is probably a good thing for my back (which my herniated disk in my back hasn’t stopped me from doing anything yet! Hoorah for that!!) and Shiveta and I share a very wide bed that has separate blankets for each person. The bathroom is small and is much like the hostel in which there is no shower but does include a bucket and ladle for us to take “baths” with. We each have our own little closet that locks and a table for our random stuff. I think it’s wonderful.

The view out our window

The first day was overly awkward, especially, or at least I thought, for me. We lugged our stuff up a flight of curly white marble stairs and were greeted with a “traditional” Indian greeting where we had a bindi, or small red dot, painted on our forehead. We were given a small blessing and then a little piece of sesame cookie. I felt like Shiveta knew exactly what to do because of being raised in a Hindu family, although later I would come to find out that she felt as much, if not more awkward because she was not raised in a more traditional Indian family such as the our host family. In fact, she felt really stressed that she was being placed into a box of what an Indian girl should be, but not being seen as who she really is. We sat together with our family on our bed and looked at their family pictures. I brought out mine and they were really excited to see my family and asked lots of questions about the pictures. They had never heard of the Grand Canyon before and quite enjoyed looking at the pictures I brought with from my parent’s rafting trip down the Colorado River within the canyon. Apparently something got lost in the translation after I showed a couple pictures of Nathan and me together, but, sorry Nathan, I guess we are currently engaged. The word boyfriend doesn’t translate into Hindi very well.

Our host mom is best friends with another host mom from the MSID program so we got together later in the afternoon with two of the other girls, both our moms and siblings, and then walked to the Laksmi temple about 3 blocks from our house. The temple is only around 15 years old but is carved completely out of white stone and marble.

(L-R) Anna, Rita, their host mom, our host brother, host mom, and Anna and Rita's host brother in front of Lakshmi temple

We took darshan, where you walk in front of the statute of the God or Goddess (in this case Goddess) and stare into his or her eyes. Then we circumnavigated the area where the Goddess is kept, finally ending back near the front where we were offered Prasad. Prasad is a small serving of food that has been offered to the deity and therefore is blessed. The closest thing I can think of to compare it to is the body and blood of Christ within the Christian faith, except that this Prasad is sweet and comes in all different forms depending on which deity one is performing darshan for. More about this later, but I swear I’m going to get fat solely off of eating the food blessed by the deities! So much more tasty than any Host wafer I’ve consumed!

Host mom and her best friend leaving the temple (Moti Doongri fort in background)

The rest of the weekend was a little stressful. I felt like it was really hard for me to get to know the family while Shiveta was having a really easy time. There were a few times when I felt like my host mom was completely ignoring me and only wanting to know about Shiveta which was making me sad and homesick. I got really sick on Saturday night and stayed up all night throwing up and having “loose motions” (as my host mom would say) which only added to me feeling really sad, homesick, and doubting my choice to ever come here. After telling my host mom that I wasn’t feeling very well, she started worrying about me nonstop. She prepared a special milk curd drink for me which was supposed to help my stomach settle down. It tasted terrible but really helped a lot. It was kind of like half curdled milky yogurt liquid with some peppery spice mixed in. It was sour and salty all at once but worked really well. My host mom also sent out our brother right away to buy plain bread and bananas so I could have something in my stomach and then feel better. She made special food for me for lunch and when it got really bad around dinner, wouldn’t leave my side until I fell asleep. In India, women comfort their children and other people by patting each others heads. This is definitely not just a normal light pat, it’s pretty hard and then they press down on your head until you fall asleep. “sleep child” WHACK WHACK “sleep child” WHACK press press WHACK. I thought she was nuts at the time but later Shiveta and my teachers confirmed what she was doing was normal. I totally did fall asleep though so I guess it works. She even offered to sleep on the floor next to me to make sure I was okay during the night. After that, she started to be a lot more open to me. I think she didn’t know how much affection to show me, where as she “knew” (by stereotyping Shiveta) how Shiveta would act. She gives me hugs and jokes with me now. I’ve really been enjoying them a lot more now.

School started on Tuesday morning (Monday was National Republic Day, kind of like our Fourth of July) and our host mom walked us to class after making us amazing breakfast. Oh yeah, the food is wonderful here. The only problem is there is so much of it. It’s almost nonstop. Our host mom has started to understand that we mean stop when we tell her we’ve had enough, but it’s hard sometimes (oh yeah, I have it SOOO hard here, getting stuffed with delicious food all the time). Breakfast always starts out with chai. Because of my aversion to caffeine, I can’t drink chai which is black tea with milk and sugar so she makes me warm dhood, or warm milk with sugar and cardamom. So amazingly good. You have no idea. The milk here is amazing, and coming from Wisconsin, I should know good milk! It’s rich and creamy and lot more sweet tasting, even without the sugar, than what we have back home, which is probably because it is so fresh. Our host mom goes to the government dairy down the street with her little milk pail every day to buy dairy products like milk, yogurt, and cheese.

Class is held on the top floor of a two story apartment building. Books and learning within India is sacred so you always remove your shoes before entering into a class room. The school has a lovely balcony, multiple small classrooms, a seating area, a small computer lab, and lots of color everywhere. We take Hindi classes in the morning broken up with a break for chai around 11. Our host mom makes us lunch everyday and packs it into a small little container with separate compartments called a Tiffin. Usually it contains a few pieces of roti (think Lefse only not quite as potato-y), some vegetable curry or dhal (lentils), and then fresh fruit. We eat out on the school’s balcony on top of little mats rolled out on the ground. In the afternoon we have country analysis classes and classes more focused on international development.

After school a few of the other girls in the group, Shiveta, and I go with our host mom to her Yoga class. I will have to leave describing Indian yoga to you for a different time, but it is quite an experience (think loud burping, chanting, yelling vowel sounds, and horse hair mats) as I am getting really tired and have to still wake up for class tomorrow. I now have a more constant source of internet so I will hopefully be updating my blog a little more regularly. Thanks again to all of you! I love you!

Much love!

View from the balcony at sunset

Massive, Welcome to India Post!

The internet is really really slow right now because I am stealing it from some random person in the next building. I have lots of pictures which I will upload as soon as I have a more reliable internet source. I'm really sorry the post isn't as cool now that I can't upload the pictures. Trust me, India is surreal and out of this world!!

Success today is taking a “shower” with only one bucket of water and a pink ladle. Perhaps I’m just a nerd, but there is something inertly exhilarating about being able to stand over a drain that also sort of drains the leaky toilet (which is oddly named Slim Commander according to the engraving on the lid) after preheating the water heater a half hour before use, fill my 2 gallon bucket and proceed to lather, rinse, and not need to repeat. Much happiness. We’re currently staying in the YWCA of Delhi and will be until Wednesday.

The "Shower"

Me after my first "Shower"

The plane ride was an uneventful, joint stiffening experience. Because of the positioning of the jet stream, the pilot decided to reroute our flight plan to fly over Scotland, into Russia, down over Iran, part of Afghanistan, Pakistan, and finally descend into Delhi. Although we all traveled in the lowest class of flight possible, each seat back included a personal touch-screen television which gave each passenger the option to fry their brain a little with some trashy television (or not so trashy, just not in any way stimulating which is probably a good thing for that long of a flight) or watch the flight play by play which was a small map charting our transcontinental journey and giving up to the minute stats on flight elevation, outside temperature, and a countdown for arrival. The map had numerous layers of zoom which would display the topography of the landscape we were flying over as well as the major cities and landforms. Prague, Tehran, and Kabul are three cities I had never thought I would be flying over in my life, but there is a first for everything.

I passed the long journey watching a season of “The Office”, playing Tetris with the little videogame controller built into the arm rest, and trying really hard to watch something quasi-educational so as to not rot (ie. Rick Steve’s travel videos about Venice, okay not that educational) but fell asleep in the middle of it. Besides the bad television watching and an occasional nap, I spent a good portion of my time eating the seemingly endless amount of food the airline shoved at us. Yes, you read that correctly, “seemingly endless”. They provided two full meals plus something called a snack pack, all totally vegetarian and also pretty darn delicious. Dinner included paneer, yogurt, those fried ball things you get from India buffets that are covered in sugary syrup goodness, a dessert bar, dinner roll, lentil bean salad thing, and bottled water. The snack pack looked more like a gift bag but included a vegetarian tortilla roll up sandwich, bottled water, cookies, chips, and fruit. Breakfast was this weird but totally delicious potato thing with paneer cheese and a rice mixture, fruit, yogurt, and a bar of some sorts.

As far as arrival goes, my bags arrived totally undamaged and customs in India is basically a joke. We proceeded through customs before picking up any of our baggage meaning there was no possible way they would check what was actually inside your checked luggage. The man at the desk spoke very minimal English yet managed to ask what I would be studying in India before he would stamp my passport. Apparently I answered correctly and could pass (much like that wizard thing in Holy Grail right? WHAT is your name? WHAT is your favorite color….)

Our next step was to drag our mountains of luggage through the rest of the terminal and enter out into a massive crowd of shouting people all waving signs about various chartered tours, taxis, hotels, and who they are supposed to be meeting. Luckily for us, the man who was supposed to pick us up was right near the door so we didn’t have to search very long. The group of students I’m with all sort of sat in the same areas on the plane so we were able to get to know each other a little better. We also had some time while waiting for our plane in Chicago to do the whole meet and greet thing (it was quite obvious who was on the trip. When Ben and I first found our boarding gate, I was the only blonde person in the entire area. It was probably a hint about what would be to come, AKA some awkwardness). The other students were nice and we starting forming those silly but necessary bonds.

After boarding a bus with the giant label TOURIST on each side that made us all feel even more ostracized, we traveled through Delhi, arriving at the YWCA around 1:00 am Indian time. The YWCA is a pretty good sized hostel that looks kind of like a mental institution, yet is clean and feels safe. Each room has a double bed like thing that shares the cover blanket but each side of the bed has its own set of sheets tucked into the space in the middle of the bed. The room also has a bathroom with a bucket “shower” a little balcony, and a small television. In India, all the electric outlets are controlled by a switch so if one wants to use something plugged into the outlet, he or she has to turn on the switch and then turn it off after use which apparently saves energy.

The Hostel includes a giant breakfast every morning. After attempting to sleep for a few hours, getting woken up from the little sleep we did get by loud chanting/singing starting at 3 am and onwards, my room mate and I gave up and headed downstairs for food. We had a very liquidy porridge/oatmeal like thing (okay that sounds pretty disgusting but it was quite delicious), a very spicy potato dish with a curry like sauce, a scrambled egg that was very very thin and almost like an omelet without the filling, fried roti, plantains, bread, and chai. Sadly I feel like I’m missing out on an important part of India with my lack of ability to drink the chai, but hopefully someone somewhere will have some herbal teas.

After breakfast we had a couple hours to spare before our classes started so a group of us decided to walk down the street to visit the nearby Sikh temple. Once we got closer, we realized the chanting that we heard all night long was coming from inside the massive temple grounds and being pumped into the Delhi air via a large PA system. Sikh is a type of very humanitarian and welcoming religion. Their temples are open to the public and many temples serve a communal, free meal to whoever wants to partake every single day. Once inside the gate, I experienced my first real sense that we were foreigners and therefore an oddity. A group of about 20 people were congregated on the side of the road leading to the main temple, and every single one of them stopped talking and just stared at us as we tried to be culturally sensitive and understand and follow the customs going on around us without any of us really knowing what to do. It was weird, but not completely uncomfortable, to be stared at by so many people. Somehow one of the guys in the group who speaks pretty fluent Hindi found the foreign visitor office. They told us to take off our shoes and cover our heads (they provided some orange/saffron colored bandanas for those of us without headscarves) and then proceed. The temple and grounds are completely made out of white marble. We washed our feat at a little station and then walked up the cold white marble stairs to see a massive temple, reflecting pool, and hundreds of people. It was amazingly beautiful. The chanting was soothing, the reverence for which all the people around us held for the temple, the stairs, the water, everything really, was inspiring, and sights, smells, sounds were almost overwhelming. It was a really wonderful way to start off the day.

The rest of the morning was spent in orientation. After lunch at the hostel, we all loaded up into jeeps for our first Indian driving experience. I will never quite be the same after that. All traffic laws within India are basically suggestions. We always joke about the damn FIBs or Illinois drivers back in Wisconsin but they would be completely lost in all the people and eventually run down and then run over because they were going too slowly. There are no lane lines and cars weave everywhere on both sides of the street (Indian drive on the left hand side). It is common for three cars to be crammed into the space of two American lanes plus a small auto rickshaw and a motor cycle while all going about 40 miles per hour. Everyone is always, ALWAYS blowing their horn. Instead of an insult, it is a way of letting people know that they are coming up on one of their sides. Although it looked like a complete mess, the traffic doesn’t really jam up or get stuck. If there isn’t a way through, the drivers are creative and make their own path. Kind of a frightening experience. Our leaders told us that the rules of who has the right of way on the road are as follows: whoever is larger and faster has the right of way, whoever has the least to lose has the right away (so a Mercedes should yield to a rickshaw simply because they don’t want to damage their car), but cows have the right of way over all. India is an odd place…..

Before dinner, a small group of girls and I walked down to the market. Although we didn’t buy anything, it was really fun to look around at everything and get lost in the massive crowds. A group of us fought the jetlag and stayed awake for the presidential inauguration which we watched on BBC. It was fun experience to witness and brings hope to us all. I will be traveling again and without Internet for a few days as we make the trip over to Jaipur. I move in with my host family on the 23rd of January and actual classes start the Monday after that.

I apologize this is so long but thank you for weeding through my garble of words. I’m finishing writing this around 6 am Indian time (I still haven’t quite gotten over the time difference but was able to sleep for a good 5 hours tonight) so another apology for the eloquence I am currently lacking. I miss you all so much and think about you daily. I really appreciate all the little emails, facebook messages, and comments you’ve been leaving me, it really makes things easier and me oh so happy! Yes yes!

Much love to you all!

One Last American Road Trip

Happy happy belated 2009 to everyone! I trust the frigid, bone chilling, freeze your face Wisconsin weather currently outside my window is treating you all just as kindly. It's less than five days before the oh so wondrous India adventure begins and the current 75 degree weather of Jaipur never sounded so good. Even as I write this, I'm still in complete disbelief that I'm leaving the continent, my goodness even the hemisphere, on Sunday (although that may just be because a place that has 75 degree weather and sun every day in January sounds too good to be true!).

I welcomed in the New Year down in Milwaukee with the lovely boyfriend Nathan and other friends at the most eclectic, yet fully Wisconsin, concert I have ever been to. The program included a polka band comprised of 80 year old men in short pants and flowered shirts who played the "Chicken Dance" (which I have recently learned is not really as large of a phenomena around the rest of the country as those in Wisconsin make it out to be) and other sing-a-long masterpieces such as "Roll Out the Barrel" and the literary magnum opus of "She's Too Fat For Me", a lady who synchronize danced with her dog in a tutu, an Elvis impersonator, and, of course, the headline band Cake. All in all, it was a wonderful night where I was surrounded with people I love and people I don't really love but couldn't help but smile at as they waved their mock plastic beersteins and ate giant pretzels.

After recovering from being smacked in the face with a little too much only-in-Wisconsin culture, Nathan, Tom, and I embarked on our cross country journey ending in Austin, Texas. We did the drive in under 20 hours of straight, energy drink filled power driving and opened the car doors to 70 degree weather and beautiful blue skies.

Nathan and Tom

Nathan and I

Much like Wisconsin, Austin has a very distinct culture that is different from anything I've seen. It stands as a liberal oasis in the red sea of Texas and has a large, thriving music scene which includes a lot of alternative, indie, and pop rock. We soaked up the sunlight, toured the University of Texas campus, ate delicious food at outdoor cafes, enjoyed all the wonderful retro looking signs, buildings, and trailers (including a cupcake stand with AMAZING carrot cake cupcakes), went kayaking, and tested out guitar after guitar after guitar at all the vintage music shops and pawn stores.

One of the many wonderful music stores

We purchased used CDs and enjoyed outdoor picnics in short sleeves.

Nathan and I having a picnic in the park

Me in front of a Koi pond at the botanical gardens

And of course took in lots of great musical performances while dreaming of one day playing for that many people.

Texas sunset on our drive back to Wisconsin

The subletters have moved into my room in the Pink House and the last of my furniture has made its way down two flights of spiral stairs to the basement. I've said a lot of very tearful goodbyes and been given many hugs and encouragement. My life right now in Stevens Point is full of anticipation, sadness, joy, loneliness, and the gigantic feat of trying to fit my entire life into one bag of luggage. Thank you so much to all of those who've given me extra moral support this last week (and the rest of my life, my goodness!). I love you all dearly. Yes yes!