One Month Marker! 15-09-2010

So blogging appears to be one of those many deceptively difficult tasks, wherein it seems perfectly daunting, so I just don’t do it. (That may have been the first usage of ‘wherein’ in a study-abroad blog ever…). That and my life just stopped seeming like something worth writing about. I think that means I really feel like I’m living here, because who wants to write about their mundane, day-to-day life?

Evidently I do. So first: village trip.

It was nothing like I expected (actually getting to understand village life/village structure), but it was really interesting nonetheless. Because our program focuses on social justice, development, environmental issues, and public health, we stayed at the training facility of this NGO that’s working to raise the status of rural Maharashtra by addressing these issues in a very grassroots, let’s-learn-from-the-people-who-actually-do-the-work approach, which was fantastic. (Like learning how to maintain crop diversity from farmers, or developing women’s support groups that actually yield social change by letting women work from areas that they feel powerful). Totally cool. Although our room was dreadful (the whole floor was one mud puddle and I showered with a snake…), but I’m kind of glad. If the accommodations had been nicer, that would have meant their funds weren’t going where they needed to go. So yay for puddle room!

Also lovely from the village trip: witnessing the life cycle of a cashew (we went from trees to cracking to baking to peeling to purchasing—I’ve been eating them all week, and they’re fantastic) and making friends with a little village girl named Saraswati! (Someone remind me if I forget to post that picture in this post (I don’t have internet at home, so I write these there and upload at school, and I don’t reread). I was a complete idiot who told her my name in Marathi and asked about her in Hindi, but I really don’t know any better. Plus, in the seven hour car ride (eight on the way back), we listened to Shakira’s Waka Waka (It’s Time for Africa) maybe 67 times, and there was much dancing. Our first Indian rave! (Someone send me that song, please. It’s been stuck in my head since the trip and I need to drive it out.)

Alright, back from the village. Then was regular life. I’m taking five classes, which is actually more than I’ve ever taken since my junior year of high school, so I’m kind of overwhelmed. They’re mostly interesting, although there are some communication issues with the teachers so we don’t always understand what the other is asking, which gets…pleasant. And the workload is much more intense than it was supposed to be for study abroad. It’s hardly too bad—the papers are pretty short and all that—but they come about every week, and are about to grow to 10 pages. BUT I do believe I will be allowed to do my final research on reproductive/maternal health of sex workers in the Pune Red Light District, which is all I really wanted to do, so I’m pumped. Plus, Hindi got easier (I can now read most all signs/book covers and speak simple sentences with prepositions in the present tense. Using lots of random nouns like the word for crow—kaua!). Plus, I mean, I’m learning lots, so that’s good.

It’s also been festival season, so we’ve been witnessing lots of that. The day after I came back from the village was Rosh Hashana, which I celebrated with apples I haggled for (unsuccessfully) off the street and fair-trade honey from the awesome NGO, shared amongst all the Jews and goyim at the center. I’m such a good Jew. But in real-world India, we saw big drum circles for Eid, and right now we’re in the middle of the Ganpati festival, which is twelve days of celebrating the lord Ganesha. So it’s pretty much insane drumming/music at all hours of the night, with idols—some small, some massive—set up all over the city and in most people’s homes. We also went to three pujas (religious ritual that pretty much involves watching people chant and clap and ring bells, totally my kind of ceremony) in about twenty-four hours, have another tomorrow night, and just skipped one tonight. Big deal holiday, this.

Beyond that, I’ve just been trying to get out in Pune more and develop more of a real life. I’ve started pointedly getting errands to run because I love walking around by myself and exploring and feeling independent, because we have lots of restrictions here that make me feel more like I’m in middle school (harsh punishments, no motorcycles, 10:30 curfew…). Sometimes I actually get to use my scant Marathi (great when used in combination with haggling!), which makes people laugh with me, but then they tend to treat me as a person, rather than an alien. I also tried, and failed, to start yoga (because who doesn’t love to get up at 5:30, walk to their first Marathi yoga class, and discover it’s been cancelled due to festival), but WILL finally start table (Indian hand drum, and I’m pumped. First class is tomorrow night!). Additionally (RELATIVES WHO STILL THINK I’M TWELVE AND NINA BUTLER, LOOK AWAY HERE), I went to a bar for the first time and bought my first legal drinks! And had my first beer that I didn’t hate! It was essentially a chocolate shot with Bailey’s and Kailua in it, and it was beautiful (yes, there are pictures of it). Thus, what I am trying to get at is I have a life.

This is much longer than it should be, considering I have to get up in 8 hours and have homework to do. Tomorrow I’m booking with a travel agent, hopefully, to go to Kerala for Diwali (where I will ride elephants and frolic with tea and live on a boat in the backwaters), so I’ll post my plan when they crystallize. (Mother: I expect them laminated and mailed back to me. Just saying.)

Bhur, bhur, bhur, Chan, Okay, Tikei, Achacha, as my host mom would say (seriously, It’s five different ways to say okay, and she says it every time. I think it’s adorable. Also fun to say. ACHACHA [technically it’s just acha, but lots of times we say achacha so that people understand that you REALLY know what’s going on]). Nap time.

03-09-2010 Unhappy Post

So it’s past 11:30 pm, and I really should be asleep right now, since I have to get up in 7 hours, but I just had a night of utter surreality and needed to get this out.

So Anna and I decided we wanted to see the Dahi Handi celebration that was happening tonight, where in honor of Lord Krishna’s birthday people make human pyramids to try to break a pot (and consequently win a large sum of money). We were told that it was starting at nine, so at 8:50, a security guard from downstairs came and walked us the couple of blocks over. It started really fun—there was no pyramid, but a really large crowd of men dancing in the most ridiculously festive way. The was much shoulder wiggling and arm floofing. It was really cool.

Except that people kept staring at us. Anna’s Korean, so just kind of blends a bit more into Indian society than pasty ol’ me, but we definitely were receiving American levels of attention. We were in spotlight. People would take pictures of us, or video (they thought they were being subtle, but really?). That’s actually how we met our additional security guard. He wouldn’t stop taping us.

It was intensely awkward, but it was funny, too. Kids would stare at me, and I would smile, and then they’d be satisfied. Until the kids who wanted a picture with us. So we did. Suddenly there was a whole circle around turned to us, because evidently it made some commotion. We moved to the back of the sidewalk, where most of the women were.

We were fine there for a while, just being bored and waiting (it was now past 10 and there was no pyramidizing). So we decide to sit, just on the curve in some shop’s doorway. Suddenly, three big men in uniform storm over and throw out the middle-aged guy who was sitting on the ledge a bit above us. The entire crowd, which was already intimidating, was glued to us. We sat, because there was nothing we could do, and tried to ignore the people gawking. Failed.

So I didn’t think I could ever possibly feel more uncomfortable in my own skin, until fifteen minutes later. Finally, many scooters and a truck of competitors showed up to compete for the pot, so we all circled around them. Including the TV cameras. Which found me in the crowd, and everyone parted to let them film me. God god god god god.

We didn’t stick around too long after that. The teams started climbing for the pot (at its highest before we left, team 2 was at 7 people high—the 7^th being a boy who couldn’t have been older than 10) and there was much cheering and back and forth. We beat it when the rain came, though, so we never got to see how it ended. Too much discomfort. I just heard a bunch of cheering and some fireworks, though, so I guess it ended somehow.

I’m not glad about how I’m still feeling itchy in my skin, or how I won’t be able to sleep for a while from it, or how I didn’t get a chance to do my Hindi homework, but maybe going was good for me. It’s true in sociology when they talk about how we always study down—studying gender means studying non-biomales, studying race means studying non-whites. So it’s not something I am aware of on a daily basis. I am here. Even though I think of myself always as Jewish, not really white, here and everywhere I’m perceived as white (and American, although now when people ask I say Canadian), with all of its connotations. I was dreadfully uncomfortable looking visually different, and I’m in a place where light skin is beautiful, and English is seen so positively, and people just want to take pictures with me. I have so, so far to come in my own confrontation of racism. I’ve been complacent, and I’ve been thoughtless. I will try to be better.

Maybe now that’s out, I can sleep. I can think about the good bits of tonight. Like the guy in the striped shirt who danced like a fettuccini noodle clown with a group of little girls who couldn’t join in the dancing fun.

2-09-2010

We’ve hit festival season in India.

Last night began Lord Krishna’s birthday, and a girl from our program invited us to her family’s temple to check it out. Sometimes, being American—consequently a guest—can really work in our favor. We got a special talk from the president of the temple, who’s evidently ridiculously connected and important, about the importance of loving God (any God, but that didn’t exactly make it less awkward if you’re not a great believer). We saw a video of the Bathing of the Deities in milk, honey, yogurt, guy, and spices and other things, and then there was dancing. I think India’s just bashing me over the head that Indians, especially Hindus, are really just browner Jews. Except for the addition of one twirl, we did an exact hora, with real clapping and circles and everything.

One of the really great things about Hinduism, I’ve come to notice, is that they’re so lovely about people of other faiths. To go to a Hindu temple on a festival is an honor, not an infringement, and they are so very accepting. Doesn’t really make me feel any better, though, about standing between the people offering prayers and they’re deities, but we were guests, so that’s what they put us.

Today, I hear tell there’s celebration involving people making human pyramids and breaking pots filled with yogurt, and the group that succeeds gets a cash prize. I need to learn more about this, but I’m definitely going hunting for this after classes.

The Ganpati festival comes up soon, which is ten days of idols of Ganesha put up all over the city. These festivals are constant! Not to mention Rosh, and Yom Kippur, and Sukkot, all of which I have to learn to celebrate in a foreign land. Lots of apples and honey is Pune, though, so I think I can concoct something.

Time for Contemporary India, so I’ll run away now, but festivals were on the mind. I’m also planning a 5 day trip for our travel week to Kerala, so I’ll probably share that when I figure it out.

28-08-2010

It has been a week since I last posted, and I know that makes me a bad blogger (a bad person?), but I’d rather live life than write about it. Sorry, Cregan.

Life here got very busy very fast. Monday, we started classes, so we’re at the school from 8 am to maybe 6:30 at night (sometimes 4:30). Long, long days. Here’s what my life typically looks like:

-7:00 Wake up, shower, clean my room/make my bed (shocking, I’m well aware). Then there’s the morning cup of chai (chaha in Marathi), and the rickshaw ride to school. After a couple days, we finally mastered how to tell the driver our stop so we don’t have to run all over the place.

-8:00 Breakfast (all thirty of us together in the program center, plus the staff, all lounging about) and more chai. We once had high hopes of getting some internet time in there, but evidently internet at the center doesn’t get turned on until 10. Sigh.

-9:00-10:00 Hindi! The hardest class I’m taking by far—that’s one complicated language. Like 12 vowels, 27 consonants, and many, many nazal, palatal, and aspirated sounds. I can’t tell most of them apart when they’re spoken, or say them, but I’m trying. PLUS SIDE: I took a strenuous evening studying and now I can read! I have no idea what anything says, and I sound a bit like a 4 year-old, but at least I’m literate. Success.

-10:15-1:15 Various classes. Contemporary India (mandatory, but really interesting class on Indian development and structure and issues and all that); Public Health (our teacher has a PhD in human sexuality, and he’s amazing); and Social Justice (I wasn’t going to take this, and I really shouldn’t, but it’s all going to be about caste and gender, and the teacher is a totally badass, revolutionary feminist. I couldn’t resist.)

-Lunch! Always an adventure.

-2:30-4:30 (or 6:30) More class. Research Methods. Meh. But it’s only for a month or two, and then we start our internships. Which are really research projects. BUT I did get my teacher to essentially promise me that I get to do research in sexual health of Pune sex workers. I’M SO EXCITED.

The rest of my life is quite taken. Walk home (get stared at really awkwardly in my whiteness and almost but never really get hit by cars, scooters, bikes, rickshaws, and dogs), hang with my host family, eat way too much food, do homework, sleep, do it all over again.

Thus far, weekends have been similarly packed. This morning, Anna and I went shopping with a bunch of people from our program on Laxmi Road, this great street packed with stores of all sorts, as well as markets and outdoor stalls and all sorts of stuff. My mission is to immerse as totally as I can into the traditional Indian fashion scene, so today I got a couple kurtas (those long tunicky shirts) and the fabric for a salwar kameez (which includes top, pants, and scarf that all have much more Indian names). That’s one of the magical features of India: tailoring is omnipresent here. You can just go into anywhere that does stitching, which seems to be everywhere, and pick from a big book of designs for every possible style of clothing, and they’ll make it for you. Cheap. Plus, a lot of stores do tailoring on their own clothes FOR FREE so that they can fit perfectly. It’s really a wonderful concept.

Okay, I really need to sleep. Tomorrow morning I have to get up at 7 because we’re trekking to some fort and hanging there all day. It should be…historical. Good to get out, though. Beyond the probably 5 miles we walked today, we never really get too much exercise. Hopefully, we can change that soon (I need to find me some yoga!). So for now, I’ll just sleep. But forthcoming is a post about my musings on my cultural upheaval. I need this chronicled, because my daily life really isn’t interesting. Or informative. I might have gotten it, but y’all really have yet to meet India. I’ll do my best to change that.

INTRODUCTION! 22-08-2010

Okay, first post, more than a week into my trip. Where, where, where to begin?

So far I’ve made friends, been oriented, received a cell phone, and moved in with my host family. I have a few key phrases in Marathi in my toolbox, have successfully crossed the street (alone and in groups) on multiple occassions, and eaten the scarily spicy green chili pepper. I guess that means that slowly but surely I’m getting acclimated to my new home. How weird is that. Hi, my name is Dani (Maaza nav Dani aahe), and I live in Pune, India, in the state of Maharastra. Ridiculousness.

Okay, so highlights thus far:

-The weather really isn’t as bad as I thought it would be. When I heard monsoon, I was afraid that it would rain all the time, and it would be awful. But the weather is actually really great. The rain is never storming, more often mist than real rain, and it just makes everything clean and cool and green. Actually, driving through the countryside from our orientation site to Pune, I’ve never seen such beautiful scenery. Ev erything is so lush and happy, with mountains and rolling fog and rivers and valleys. Right out of a book.

-The people on our program have been pretty much universally great. My roommate and I get along, the rest of the kids are great and excited and supportive, the head of our program is this truly lovely woman named Utaara who is like a mom to us all out here and reminds me a bit of Mrs. Mazer (for those of you from my Jewy youth), and the rest of the staff are uniformly sweet and helpful.

-I’m really white. I don’t think I ever actually felt that before, but in Pune, it’s really a very unusual thing. I get stared at all the time, little kids just come up yelling “Auntie, Auntie!” at me and laugh, and rickshaw guys sometimes don’t want to bother with me. I just wish I could understand what people are saying.

-I held a baby goat. It got mad at me.

-I think I’m going to be very, very busy here. Five classes, extra Marathi lessons, “expressive culture” classes (I think I want to take tabla, but we’ll see how that goes), yoga. And then my host family has decided that my roommate Anna and I, along with the other American students who are being hosted by friends of theirs, will be learning an Indian dance (Kathak?) and performing it at the end of the semester. THERE WILL BE NO VIDEOS.

-Indians never stop eating. Food food food all the time, and second, third, fourth helpings. And you always have to clean your plate (and eat with your right hand only, which is lots of fun), and then you drink tea many times a day and eat biscuits. We can’t fight the system, so we’ll all come back huge. At least we’re prepared.

On that note, I need to go eat breakfast. It will probably be spicy, and there will be too much of it. Predictable, unpredictable India.