Falling in love with India……finally

NAMASTE,

It has been rocky but the moment has finally arrived, the moment where I fell in love with India. I was riding to work in a tempo after having woken up covered in bed bug bites and going to the pharmacy and buying anti-itch cream. On the tempo a woman smiled at me, pulled my hair, showed me her mahendi (henna designs on her arm), called me her new sister, and expressed how much she wanted to learn English. That is when I realized that despite the chaos, the discomfort, and the cow poo everywhere; India is a gem. The richness of this culture is unexplainable but I have found a level of acceptance here that I never thought possible with people who I share so little in common culturally.

It has been awhile since my last post, sorry guys but it has been a hectic week. I have gone to the village again and taken a vacation to Delhi/Agra since my last post. I just want to say I took some amazing pictures this week and yall cannot handle them all in a single post so you have to tune in again soon for those Taj Mahal and Lotus Temple pics that I know you are dying to see. Also, the shopping was AMAZING! I cannot wait to show everyone all the stuff I had to bargain my butt off for in the bazaar of the capitol city.

It was amazing to see two great cities of India, Agra and Delhi, and experience the Indian Railway System for the first time. The more beautiful places that I visit, the more I realize that for some reason it is always the people I meet that have the most impact on me when I travel. It is always the interactions with other people that I remember and cherish the most. I met a wonderful woman named Sonya at the train station on the way to Agra, she was a lawyer in Delhi for 20 years and she has been a life coach for the past 5 years. She has visited over 30 countries in her life but will always remain a lifelong resident of India. We talked for a long while about tradition, family, and the caste system in India. It was amazing to pick her brain. Another great person I met in Delhi was Muhammad, an Indian by birth, he went to high school in the United States but has been living in India for 1.5 years now buying real estate and clearing up litigation around it then reselling it for profits in the six-figures (American dollars). He had some very interesting views on the current state of India as well, though I did not agree with most of them. He told me that independence was the worst thing that ever happened to India and that if the British were still ruling then everything would be better, like I said RADICAL. He also said that the slum dwellers were a cancer that was going to eventually destroy India, funny I feel like I have heard a quote very similar about poor blacks and latinos in the US.

I keep coming back to three random thoughts that I want to share.

1. Lost in Translation
   

The longer that I stay here the more I realize just how big of a barrier language can be. Although most of the time there is always a translator with me or someone who knows Hindi, I feel like a lot is being lost in translation. It just seems that stories are not as rich, jokes are not as funny, and pain is not as heartfelt when translated. It scares me to think that I may not truly be addressing the needs of the community because of these lost messages.

1. Ownership and Responsibility
   

This has been an issue as we design our project; we have tried to make sure our organization has a firm hand in it so they can sustain it well after we leave. Everyone seems to understand that this is their community and they have a much larger stake in it than we do. We understand that we are outsiders. On the other hand, we all got pissed at the Taj Mahal when foreigners had to pay 750 rupees and Indians only had to pay 10 rupees. However, when you talk about ownership it makes perfect sense. This is their country so it is only logical that Indians would pay less. We felt like we should not have to pay the tourist price because we had been here one measly month, and that was wrong of us. I am starting to feel like I only talk the talk of community ownership when it is beneficial for me (Ex. When it means less work for me and more work for my NGO) but when it does not benefit me then I want to embrace a "global unity" mentality. I don't really know what I am getting at here but I will try and hash it out later.

1. Girls All Over the World Just Wanna Have Fun!
   

I feel like people all over the world are fascinated by Indian women. We see the beautiful saris, nose rings, and precious jewelry and hear about the arranged marriages and the caste system but there is so much we do not see or hear about so we just assume that their lives must be drastically different than our own. For example, Indian women do not have to cover their hair but most do. As a Westerner, I could say that is oppressive but after being here awhile I know that is just not true. It is actually hot as hell here, and covering your head actually cools you down. I am not saying that Indian women are liberated by any means but I am saying that by being here I am seeing more parallels between their lives and my own than I ever could have imagined. The Indian women that I have met love shopping, jewelry, perfumes, cooking, and doting on their children. Sounds just like every American woman I know, including my own family and friends. Many of the women I have met here, either through work or just on the street, have looked out for me as if I were their own daughter or sister. The spirit of camaraderie here between women is awe-inspiring. Whether a woman was buying me a coke or saving me from a rabid dog, my spirit has truly been touched every time by these women and their kindness.

Random stuff from trip

-I jumped off a moving train in Agra and fell, knocking over a woman and her baby. Forgive me Jesus J.

-We went to a club in Delhi and paid 1000 rupees to drink and get ripped off finding a way home. But we rode the New Delhi metro station to get there which was sooooo nice.

-I fed some cookies to a monkey off the side of the train.
Ok that's enough for now, I feel like I have been typing forever but I promise to update again soon. Only 2.33 more weeks, time flies.
Jen