Kittens Make Me Happy

One of the things I look forward to everyday is seeing if the kittens have grown. Mumbai has a good number of stray animals, dogs, cats, and chickens. Our building compound doesn't see any chickens or really even any dogs, but we have a lot of cats. Its a cat friendly area with minimal traffic and lots of hiding places. A couple of weeks ago I heard a tiny "mew" come from the back window and opened it to see the smallest, cutest kitten in the world staring up at me. Now Mama and her three little ones are regular tenets at our building compund. People put out little food treats for them and watch the kittens scamper about and explore. It is such a treat to have them around and watch them grow.



Adorable! The kittens and their scampering clumsiness remind me of baby Howard (my pet cat who is now living with my parents. I adpoted him when he was just about the same size as these little ones.) Really, these kittens are some of the best friends I have here in India. But I don't dare name them because I know one day they'll be big enough or bold enough that they won't turn up at my window. Until then, I'll just swoon over them like a little girl.

She's Conspicuous

Staring does not seem to be a social faux pas here. So when you’re a six-foot tall white girl…you get stared at, by women, even more by men, and especially by teenage boys. In the tourist district you sometimes see foreign women, college girls and twenty-somethings, wearing strappy tanktops and skirts that fall above the knee. Outfits like that are a traditional no-no, and because staring isn’t, they’re in for a big dose of unwanted attention. (Although I have to say here that you see quite a few Indian young women wearing “Western” clothing, especially in Mumbai and Delhi. But this usually means jeans or trousers and t-shirts, nothing that is by any means skimpy.) Once you’re out of Colaba, the main tourist and business traveler’s area, you rarely come across foreigners. Then it doesn’t matter what you’re wearing.

For a while, feeling so conspicuous was making me paranoid. When I’d go for walks I’d feel like groups of people were talking about me or laughing at something about me as I passed. This is ridiculous, I know. But going on walks is one of the few remotely interactive pastimes that I have after I finish up my volunteering sessions for the day. I don’t like feeling so solitary and uncomfortable just going for a walk, which is normally one of my favorite activities. Really, I have this urge to go to the chai wallah on the corner, buy a cup, and squat down on my haunches and sip it while all the other men gathered there go about their business. This will never happen though, because no matter how long I live here, no matter that the chai wallah sees me walk by every day, I’ll always be a white woman. My approach alone, whether I order a chai or not, is a total conversation stopper. Though I'm not up to hanging out with the chai-sippers yet, I’m learning that the best way to handle the staring is to walk confidently with a faint smile on my face, sometimes making eye contact and offering a smile of greeting—most people beam back, or say hello. A few more weeks and hopefully I’ll be able to find going out for a walk a more pleasurable experience.

But again, it’s different in the tourist area where there are more beggars and hawkers. There its best to avoid eye contact or you’ll be followed for 20 yards by men selling ridiculous things you would never need or want, like silly little drums, laminated maps, or huge balloons. Or you’ll meet eyes and be followed by little children in rags or women carrying babies, trying to keep walking, trying not to look while a lump of guilt sits in your throat. Zuber says the beggars don’t get to keep most of the money they collect. He says that there is usually someone behind the scenes that organizes the beggars and offers them “protection,” then charges most of their collections for these “services.” Seeing some of these people, though, is when it is hard for me not to stare—especially when there are little children, barefoot with matted hair and swollen bellies, or people crawling on their shriveled limbs, or waving the stump of an arm.

Being conspicuous also has the strange result of being asked to take photos with a lot of people. Yesterday I walked from my flat to Chowpatty beach and as I sat on the public beach reading the newspaper, I was asked by three different people to take a photo with them. The day before at my favorite local gathering place, Priyadarshni Park, a group of women and their children wanted their picture taken with me. A quick snap on a camera phone is one thing, but two of these people used up a frame of actual film! I don’t get it…the only thing I can thing of is that it has something to do with everyone’s innate desire to gawk at things they find disturbing or freakish, and to be able t prove that they saw it to their friends. I just wonder how many random photo albums I’ll end up in over the course of our stay here.

Another Bunch of Photos from December

Here is one more set of photos from my trip to north India in December. Soon I'll have more recent stories and photographs to share. The slow internet connection here is making me a slow post-er. But I hope to be up to date soon. Until then, here are some pics from Jaipur, the forts near Jaipur, and Pushkar.

This is Jaipur, called "The Pink City" after the pinkish wash on the buildings in the old center. As you can see, motorcycles are a very popular mode of transportation in India. I think Jaipur had the craziest traffic of any city I've ever been to. Worse than Mumbai traffic because of the sheer diversity of vehicles, people and animals occupying the road. Though it looks calm in this photo, the streets are normally crowded with cars, trucks, buses, motorcycles, autorickshaws, bicycle rickshaws, bicycles, carts pulled by oxen or camels, pedestrians and the occasional elephant. Put all of these in a roundabout, and you've got trouble.



You can see the reddish-pink of the walls better in this photo, taken from inside Jaipur's City Palace. The palace was built by the Maharaja of Jaipur, its namesake Jai Singh.



Fun fact: This is the largest silver object in the world. When Jai Singh traveled to England, he brought along his own water supply, river water from the Ganges, in this huge urn.



In the hills above the city stand three forts. Yes, we saw many-a-fort on this trip. These weren't particularly well-maintained, but they provided a nice view of the valley and the city itself. Here's a shot from fort one:



This is the view of the town of Amber from the Amber fort and palace. Some tourists opt to ride an elephant to the top of the hill rather than climbing up to the fort on foot.



Some fellow tourists enjoying a picnic at Amber palace:

Some women on a crew doing restoration work on the palace. Like most of the construction I've seen done in India, things are done largely by hand with hand tools.

The third of the palace forts provides a panoramic view over Jaipur. You can see very far, despite the smog.

Enjoying a sweet lassi at the hole-in-the-wall Lassiwallah in downtown Jaipur. Delicious and served the traditional way in an unglazed ceramic cup.

The holy lake at Pushkar:

The Brahma Temple at Pushkar:

Golden Triangle Part II: Jaipur and Beyond

We traveled by car from Agra to Jaipur through some very rural areas. Even parts of the Agra itself had a distinctly rural feel: the goats, cows, women carrying grass bundles atop their heads, scattered lean-to like shops. But traveling between these cities allowed us to see some decidedly agricultural areas with a few towns scattered along the way. Coming from Iowa and spending my university years in Decorah, I thought I knew small towns, but these places in rural India were SMALL. I probably shouldn’t even use the word “town” to describe them; “village” might be more appropriate. Several of these villages seemed to completely revolve around marble and stone carving. Certain stretches of the road were lined with stone elephants, lions, vases and planters, and giant marble slabs. The people who do all of the cutting and carving, much of it by hand it seems, were all covered in a layer of fine white dust. They didn’t wear any protective gear, or dust masks.

It was lovely driving through the fields. I think most were planted with grass, or some kind of oil crop (though I can’t be sure). They must be heavily irrigated because the landscape itself is very dry and dusty. I can’t imagine how hot and parched this area must be during the hottest months of the year. But when we were there, the fields were the most vibrant, natural green that I’ve seen since arriving in India. And looking out over the fields, you see a brilliant flash of color, bright blue or yellow, or orange, a woman’s sari! The colors of the fabrics are amazing, and it was really a beautiful sight.


Jaipur

We spent five days in Jaipur which gave us a chance to see everything we wanted to in the city and do a couple of daytrips to the three area forts, and the towns of Pushkar and Ajmer. A friend of John’s and mine who grew up in Jaipur was kind enough to arrange for us to stay with his parents during our visit. It was awkward at first, but by the end of our stay we were all pretty comfortable around each other. My belly wasn’t all that comfortable though—our hostess, Bima, made delicious food, but her idea of hospitality was to feed her guests ridiculous amounts of everything. I haven’t been force-fed so much since my Spanish host mother was trying to fatten me up! It was nice to stay in a real home though, and it definitely made our experience in Jaipur a little more authentic. We saw most of the sites in the “Pink City” including the City Palace, built by Jaipur’s namesake the Maharaja Jai Singh. We did a lot of walking and shopping—the state of Rajasthan is famous for handicrafts, jewelry, textiles and traditional miniature paintings, so there was plenty of window shopping to do.


Pushkar & Ajmer

One of our day trips from Jaipur we hired a car and drove to Pushkar and Ajmer. Again, the car journey was an experience, and a good way to see the “in betweens” of the country, the places between destinations. I almost wish I had some video clips from the drive because I’m finding it difficult to adequately describe the things I saw. The descriptions from my journal that I jotted down during the trip don’t really convey the impact some of the images had on me. But here is a list of things I saw anyway:

Droopy-eyed camels pulling carts with wooden wheels

Three-wheeled trucks, their beds full of women in colorful saris, seated and shielding their eyes from the dust of the road

A young boy with a long stick, herding a group of goats across the road

Two old men sitting in white plastic chairs on the side of the road, legs crossed, reading newspapers

Children at a water pump, playing and washing each other

Men wearing white cotton clothing and bright orange turbans, their faces wrought with wrinkles

Anyway, after a few hours we arrived in a chaotic Pushkar, unaware that it was a festival day, though exactly what kind of festival I'm still not sure as we didn't encounter anyone who spoke enough English to explain it to us. Pushkar is a holy city with a holy lake. The site is where the Hindu god Brahma dropped a lotus flower, and where its petals landed water miraculously formed in the midst of the desert. This holy lake has always been a site of religious pilgrimage as people come to bathe in its water and do puja, a Hindu religious ceremony, at its stepped banks. Pushkar’s long history as a religious site and a traders’ hub has made it a bustling and entrepreneurial city. People have come up with all kinds of ways to make money off of the visitors as they wander the streets. The most common seem to be selling handicrafts or food, dressing in especially colorful garb and posing next to a cow for potential photos, and blessing people (whether they want to be blessed or not) and then asking for a “donation.” It makes for a place where you have to keep your guard up all of the time. I’m just glad we weren’t there during the annual camel fair when the region attracts tens of thousands of people!

All in all it was a good but exhausting trip. I never thought I’d say it, but I was actually relieved to be returning to Mumbai by the end of it!

Pictures!

I was finally able to find a strong enough wireless signal to upload some photos, so here are a few...

This is the view from our hotel window in Delhi. This photo was taken in early morning, so the street was still calm.

This is the Red Fort is Old Delhi. The formidable walls are made of red sandstone, though you can't appreciate the color as much in the morning haze of clouds and smog

Many of the structures inside the Red Fort were made of white marble with really beautiful Islamic features: arches, intricate inlays and domes:

This is Humayan's tomb, built by the Moghul ruler's widow. As you can see, IT'S HUGE.

This is a Bahai temple. I don't know much about the religion, except that it has only been around since the 1800s and it has a very universalist doctrine. This "Lotus" temple is surrounded by expansive, well-maintained gardens. Hundreds of people line up to go inside where absolute silence is strictly maintained, and people of all religions are invited to meditate or pray. I think its probably the most peaceful place in Delhi.

This is Agra Fort which was very impressive and well-maintained, and especially beautiful at sunset.

Again, the interior structures, like this public meeting hall, are made of white marble:

The interiors are very ornate, with inlaid precious stones, and gold leaf paint:

We saw lots of monkeys!:

I took about a million photos of the Taj Mahal, because you really just can't help it when you're there, it's just so amazing. But this is my favorite one, and probably my favorite photo from the whole trip:

And some more Taj Mahal pictures:

More soon!

The Golden Triangle Part I: Delhi and Agra

Happy New Year, friends! The following post is a sort of flashback to a trip our friend Marc and I took just before Christmas. We spent 10 days traveling in north India, visiting the "Golden Triangle" of tourist destinations, Delhi, Agra and Jaipur and a few place in between before heading back to Mumbai for the holiday. Of course, I haven't described everything I'd like to, or included as much detail as I'd like to. But if I tried to do that, I'd never get any stories posted here. Also, I know some of you have been anxiously awaiting more photos... unfortunately, I'm having some trouble uploading them with my internet connection. Hopefully I'll find a way to post some more soon. Until then, here are a few reflections on the first few days of the journey, spent in Delhi and Agra.

Delhi:
Before arriving in Delhi, all we heard was warnings: don’t go anywhere alone, don’t get tricked by rick drivers, don’t talk to anyone on the street or ask for directions; be careful because people will try to rob you, con you, poison you…man! I knew people were just trying to express their care for me with these warnings. And it is common knowledge that caution and good old common sense are necessary traveling companions in Delhi. As Zuber told me, “Delhi is the crimeyest [sic] city in India.” I knew it really couldn’t be as bad as all of the warnings suggests…after all, poison? But really, the atmosphere in Delhi did seem very different than in Mumbai. I can’t be sure how much of the perceived difference was actual and how much had been scared into me, but on that first day, it did seem more aggressive, less friendly…colder, and not just in temperature.
Given, we stayed in a part of town that feeds on tourists, a backpacker central called Main Bazaar. Though it’s depicted on the map as a pretty major thoroughfare, the street was actually very narrow and crowded, closed to cars but open to pretty much everything else, including scooters, auto-rickshaws, bicycle-rickshaws, vendors and delivery carts, cows, cats, dogs and of course pedestrians. The street is lined with shops, mostly selling cheesy souvenirs but with some fabric shops, jewelers, eateries and other businesses interspersed. There are a lot of seedy, aka “budget” hotels in this area and the shops depend on selling trinkets to their patrons, and the eateries depend on selling food to the trinket-vendors as far as I can tell. The bright colors of the blankets, shawls, clothing and fabrics for sale really jump out from the background of buildings which are all covered in a think layer of dust and exhaust grime, many of which are crumbling. At roof-level is a tangled web of power lines strung seemingly haphazardly from building to building.

All in all, it was a chaotic and sort of overwhelming place to stay. I enjoyed seeing other parts of Delhi where I wasn’t hassled every few feet with, “come into my shop, madam, take a look, I make deals just for you. You want shawls? Bags? Saris? Very beautiful…etc. etc.” One day we hired a driver to take us around to monuments in the city. He wasn’t a guide, but he dropped us off at various places and gave us time to wander around. We visited some very impressive Moghul monuments: forts, palaces and mosques of the 17th century Muslim rulers of this part of India. We also saw a few temples...Jain, Krishna Consciousness, and Bahai, the famous Lotus Temple. (Pictures and some more info to come, hopefully)

At one point during the day we were forced to spend five minutes walking through an upscale handicraft emporium where the driver most certainly received some money for taking there, and would have received commission on anything we might have purchased. I’m sure this Delhi driver had a similar setup with the veg restaurant where he dropped us for lunch. It was a pretty dodgy-looking place. But it was full of people, mostly tourists both Indian and foreign, who looked like they wouldn’t have chosen to eat lunch there on their own. It was called “Splash” and had windows covered with sea-life motif translucent paper, and aquariums full of sickly fish under the bars. The food was surprisingly good though.

Agra:
After a few days in Delhi, we took a train to Agra, a couple of hours southeast of the capital. The railway stations here are places and a half. Almost indescribably busy and sense-assaulting, navigating the train station took every bit of concentration I could muster. Vendors, cons, coolies, beggars, officials, rats, reservation officers and hundreds and hundreds of passengers crowd the platforms. When the train arrived we weren’t even sure it was ours. There really weren’t any distinguishing marks on the outside of the cars, and the digital sign above the platform was completely wrong. But after asking several people and deciding to board, after finding our compartment from all of the cars with a myriad of different class markings, after finding our reserved seats (we hoped!) and pulling out of the station, a train official eventually made his way to us and there were our names and ticket numbers in his notebook. There does seem to be an order to the chaos in the end. And the order must be characterized by some kind of efficiency given the number of passengers accommodated each day.

Our arrival in Agra was a bit hectic, due mainly to an aggressive and disorganized pre-paid rick stand at the railway station. But we eventually made it to our hotel, checked in and then set off to spend the evening at Agra Fort. It’s a shame that some people come to Agra on a day trip from Delhi and only see the Taj Mahal because the fort is a very impressive monument as well. Like the fort in Delhi, this one was a Moghul palace and stronghold. I’m especially glad that we saw it at sunset when the red sandstone of the outer walls and many of the interior structures really seems to glow.

The Taj Mahal was, of course, amazing…indescribable, really. The sheer enormity of the structure, its symmetry, the whiteness of the marble, the intricacy of the inlay patterns…it all adds up to a pretty awesome sight. We spent the whole morning there, then spent the afternoon wandering. At sunset we climbed to a dingy rooftop café to watch the Taj change colors in the sunset. It was strange to look out at such a magnificent structure from a roof-top in such a dilapidated, frankly poverty-stricken area. As in Mumbai, though not really to the same degree, the disparity in wealth in Agra is apparent. Though the whole area around the Taj is pretty run-down, the street with the majority of the hostels is comparatively clean, a little wider with just a few animals. One street over there are piles of garbage, tons of goats, and open sewers. But in the midst of all of that, I saw some beautiful children with radiant smiles when we strayed a bit off of the beaten path; we encountered a group of playful young ones, all shouting hello and wanting to shake our hands. Its startling to see such joy and such poverty simultaneously, which makes me reexamine my notions about both.

Next post: Golden Triangle Part II: Jaipur and Beyond…