India

India! Oct 14 - Oct 18
Tuesday
On the first day in India, I went to two different schools in the middle of Chennai. For both my Science education and education around the globe classes, I facilitated a science activity for the students there. The activity was to have the students build paper pressure rockets. Each school had us sit through welcoming ceremonies such as a song or two sung by the whole school, a big part of Indian culture. The first was an all-girls school. They spoke fairly good English but were very timid. It took them a while to get the drift of the experiment. However, my partners and I were just getting the idea as well of how to run the activity as well. The second school was coed, but with a strong separation within the school of boys and girls. The boys were sat in very neat rows on the right and girls on the left. My partners were surprised when all of a sudden we were facilitating the experiment from at least one hundred students. We set up in the middle of the court yard. Since we weren't prepared for quite that many, we pulled pairs of students out from the crowd and brought them up to build a rocket. They got into the experiment like I had hoped and the other students had fun counting down seconds till the launch of each rocket. We could barely clean up the experiment because students didn't want to stop building! They kept grabbing for the supplies so they could fit in more launching! I must have shaken a thousand hands and signed autographs like crazy! The principle invited us into her office for tea and biscuits and we got to have a discussion of their school system. That was when I realized what I had been hearing about the Indian head-bob was true! Indians really do bob their heads. It is a side-to-side motion...like a bobble head! Later that evening a whole group of us decided to go out for some good food. Some friends and I ordered a couple dishes to share around...not good Indian custom. I later found out that t is very frowned upon to eat from the same plate. I don't think the waiter liked us very much. Then we some of us decided to go catch a Bollywood movie. We hired a couple of rickshaw (rickshaws are the funky looking mini, mini vans with only three wheels) drivers and headed to the cinemas. Driving in India is always an adventure whether you are traveling by bus, car, or auto-rickshaw (a three wheel mini, mini van). Lanes are coincidental. No one stays within a lane. Often times your driver will just cruise right down the middle of two. And sidewalks? …sidewalks were an abrupt after-thought...people here normally just walk down the side of the street. The movie was a typical American plot about getting framed for a murder, escaping from jail and running from the corrupt authorities and ending happily ever after. It was all in Tamil but we could understand it just fine with the help of dramatic music and expressive the actors. We were caught by surprise by the intermission half way through the movie. Not that the movie was super long or anything...it is just normal for there to be a ten minute snack and commercial break. Looking around the theater my friend and I realized that there were no other females in the theater. I think that there is an unsaid rule about women being out late. On the way back to the port our same rickshaw drivers let each of us drive the funny little things! Because of the hour there were few vehicles out...which made it nice not to have to worry about the mass swarm of traffic.

Wednesday was packed with things to see and taste!
I went on a school trip at 7am. We hopped on a bus to go temple hopping throughout Mamallapuram. After that we drove to a silk shop and saw how they made the sarees on the silk loom and got a chance to purchase a few. There were sarees, scarves galore, wall hangings, as well as man skirts (not sure what they are called), and ties.
After purchasing too much we drove two hours to a resort to have lunch. The drive was well worth every minute because when we got there it was a massive buffet with dishes and dishes of exquisite Indian food and deserts. My personal favorite is Dosa bread with masala all the wonderful chutneys! They are so good! I was surprised by my obscured understanding of Indian food. Rarely in India will you ever find a fruit chutney…they are all spicy vegetable or meat-filled chutneys. I also fell in love with Chai! Ahh! I don’t know why I have never been a Chai coniessur before. It is a little cup of heaven! Once we were done we headed back out again to see our last couple of Hindu monuments.
Thursday, I went on a rural Indian village stay. The whole trip was put on by an organization called the Rural Institute of Developmental Education (RIDE). They have been working to eradicate child labor as well as empower women by creating self-groups. Schools in rural areas are typically low quality. Teachers show up when they please and not much of an education is offered to the children. At the school, I could here the sound of the stone quarries at work which still employs the local children. The students were so excited to see us. They ranged from three to ten years old and were divided into two groups, the children who attended school full-time and the children who divide their time between the stone quarries and school. When we arrived we spent a few minutes meeting the kids and sharing stickers and school supplies that we had brought individually. I was so impressed by how much the organization was doing to help these children. The employees of RIDE have such a great vision for the future of their students and a spirit of selfless service.
A few kids danced for us, which was so great! Those kids really know how to swing some hips! Since we don’t dance nearly that well, some others and I sang a few songs like I’m a Little Teapot, and You Are My Sunshine. I’m not sure if they knew what the heck we were singing about but I think they liked it! J When the kids left for home, we had a really interesting Q&A with the founder of RIDE, and some of the teachers about the organization and the lives of the students.
We returned to the guest house and had an amazing home-cooked meal. The ladies that ran the guest house were so humble, welcoming, and accommodating, as often Indians are. When I returned to my room I got to know the German school teacher, Bierget, who was staying in the same room with me and 2 others on my trip. She has also been traveling around the world. In India she has been helping to set up a library in a local school. It was hard to sleep that night. There was no a/c in the room and I couldn’t help sticking to my sleeping bag from all of the humidity. Outside I could hear the sounds of dogs barking, cows mooing, stones being thrown at clever monkeys, and the TV blaring soap-opera next door. The government gives out free TVs to families, hoping that households would use them to watch the government-operated news station. But the fact of the matter is that people spend the news hours to take a break from the show that they are wrapped up in.

Friday morning, we left to visit the nearby village where one of the women self-help groups was located. We all celebrated international Women’s day together. We talked about the daily struggles of rural life, and they showed us around the village. We were invited into multiple houses and met so many ladies and families. All of the women were incredibly humble, lighthearted, and warm. After being shown around the village, we were taken to the local temple. They prepared coconuts for us to drink from and we all sat together in the shade on the temple floor to continue with more discussion. They even had us play games with them, one of which was hot potato with a basketball (music supplied by two people chanting and clapping)! The women were so lively and such great sports. The winners were given decorative tin plates, and all received vegetable planting seeds.
We returned to the guest house for our last fabulous meal, then left to see the silk shop that I had visited a couple days prior. One of the peddlers, who had hassled me a couple of days earlier, continued his work, pressing me to buy his wooden sandals. When he realized I wasn’t budging he decided to make conversation instead. I told him my name but not being able to force it from his mouth he decided to rename me Sonia, haha. We piled back onto the bus we set out for a three hour ride back to the port in Chennai.


I spent Saturday I spent soaking up my last opportunity for spicy masala and chai, and wandering through colorful markets. India caught me by surprise. I was aware that it is an incredibly dense population; home to around one billion people. I was shocked by the amount of poverty within the country. Unlike Namibia and South Africa you can’t chose what you see in India. The hardships are visible everywhere one goes. But behind the shocking numbers and often brutal living conditions for the majority of Indians, there is a strong sense of unity. Hinduism is part of daily life for the majority although there are a few who practice others like Islam and Christianity.

All of India was fantastic! Everyone on the ship had very intense experiences and was really moved by what they encountered. India looks dirty and uninviting from the view of the air conditioned bus, but once off the bus, and immersed in the culture and with the people, it is overwhelmingly beautiful. There is an incredible sense of love and hospitality that Indians have and share. If you smile at them and share a moment, you get that smile and love back three fold. They are so in touch with their capacity for goodness. It is hard for me to make sense of the contrasts of India's gruesome visual images verses it’s touching, and embracing culture. But what I know is that the ladder has left the biggest impression.