No - unfortunately - this is not a Blink 182 tribute.
It's a tribute to the small things. Of Pondicherry. Or, rather, of Rainbow Nagar, which is my neighborhood in Pondicherry. A toast, if you will, to the small things of Rainbow Nagar:
To the juice stand man.
Twenty rupees (less than fifty cents) for fresh-squeezed juice. Orange juice, pineapple juice, grape juice, pomegranate juice... some fruit-that-I-don't-even-recognize juice. I really have never appreciated grape juice until India. Who knew it could be so good? The preservatives, the sugar, the ... extra liquid-y stuff added to every grape juice I've ever tasted, and ... I think you'd be skeptical too. Well, I decided to give it a shot. There's this little fruit juice shop on the street corner, with this one little man inside. He sits in the shade all day until a customer walks up to his stall. Then, he - slowly - stands up, grabs some fruit hanging on the ceiling, and starts a'juicin' (<-- can that be a word?). Pours it into a little glass cup, throws in a little straw. And sits back down. In the shade. But, I might add, I've watched the evolution of our friendship and I think he puts a little more effort into my grape juice these days. What started as a simple, "Grape juice." "Thank you." conversation has flourished into "What are you doing in Pondicherry?" and "What do you want today?" Bff.
To sitting on the back of a motorcycle, weaving through Indian traffic.
Anyone that has done this knows this doesn't need an explanation.
To those sassy ladies in the beauty parlor.
I walked into the "A/C Ladies Beauty Parlor" with the intention of having my eyebrows "threaded." The lights were off, the front room empty. "Hello?," I called out. Two women, maybe in their thirties, came rushing out of the back with huge smiles. They sat me down in a brown high-chair and carefully examined my eyebrows, before examining everything else I need to do to make myself more beautiful. Creams, waxing, henna, tattoos... "Do you have any tattoos??," they asked so excitedly. "Yes..." I replied. I pulled up the leg of my left pant as they pulled out their camera phones. I think the photo shoot took more time than they spent on my eyebrows. Then we chatted some more about Indian beauty products. Then they showed me pictures of their entire families. I loved it.
To the "shortcut street."
We found a faster way to get to the main road. It's only one block closer, but it means we don't have to walk on the bustling "S-curve" to get to the main road. The shortcut street is the road on the left, after the banana stand. Every time I take it, I remember where I am. Slums. Garbage. Dogs with some sort of... something - disease or scars or utters that need to be milked. The first time we found the shortcut street, we didn't even notice the dogs. I don't know how. We weren't paying attention. These things can go unnoticed, when there is so much going on around you. You're making sure that you don't get run-over by a motorbike, or that you aren't stepping in something questionable. But the second time, maybe because it was a little more familiar and we knew where we were going, we noticed. We didn't talk. I think we may have even gasped. Families squatting around a small fire. Goats standing on trash piles taller than I am. Remember where you are.
To the ladu-sellers.
There's a trend in India. Where there is one cell-phone store, there are ten other cell-phone stores. Where there is one plastic furniture store, there are ten other plastic furniture stores. Where there is some restaurant with the word "King" in the name, there are ten other restaurants with "King" in the title. I think you get the idea. Well, Rainbow Nagar has sweet shops. Maybe twenty sweet shops. I resisted the Indian sweets at first. They were just too sweet. And I have a sweet tooth, so just know, that me saying this... well, sometimes Indian sweets taste like a spoonful of sugar mixed with melted sugar on top of it. They're just too sweet. But, as I have recently found since living in Rainbow Nagar, sometimes they are the most glorious tasting sweets one can imagine, like the ladu. A ladu is a mixture of chickpeas, saffron, almonds, raisins, and cardamon.. which is fried in some sugar mixture. It's incredible. And only 5 rupees.
To the women I pass on the street.
There is something so special about traveling as a woman in India (not that I would travel as a man...?). Being able to interact with Indian women is not something Western men would get to do. And, likewise, I don't interact with Indian men in the same way that Western men would... but I can still talk to Indian men, without too many social taboos being broken. But I'm not talking about the men. I'm talking about the women, and how it feels when you are walking along the street, and you see a woman walking towards you. And she's staring - directly into your eyes. No blinking. No smile. In fact, she looks like she's judging you. And you, for a moment, freak out and look away - avoid eye contact - because in your culture, that is just plain rude. You don't stare at people like that. Why is she staring at me like that? My shoulders and knees are covered. I'm even wearing a churidar. I'm trying! Can't you see??
Ok, enough. I've been here long enough to know that staring at someone in India is different than staring at someone at home. It's not rude.
So I've taken a different approach. I stare back. Into her eyes. And then I smile. And she looks shocked, just for a second. She didn't expect that. And then she smiles back at me, and we hold that smile and those locked eyes until we pass each other. It's one of the single most beautiful things I've experienced while being here.
To all the small things.
To the broken sidewalks.
Back home, you can tell someone is local by the way they cross the street. It's kind of the same thing here. In the States, at a busy cross-walk, locals start crossing the street before anyone else. They know the light is about to turn red, and they know that the little, white walking man is about to appear. They know it's safe to start crossing. Kind of the same thing here. Kind of. But instead of knowing when the "walk" sign is about to turn, locals know where on any given street one can walk. I'm aware, this sounds really ... obvious. But it's not like I'm saying, a local person knows they can walk on a sidewalk, or the road...? It's different. On some blocks, there is no sidewalk. On others, there is construction. On others, there are some gaps between large square-shaped rocks, so you either have to jump and hope you don't land in the gutter (and God only knows what's in there), or you know to take a different route. Sometimes you're walking along the sidewalk and then all of a sudden you're in the midst of twenty men socializing at a chai stand and they aren't about to move for you, so you better walk around. Or maybe there's a forty-foot stretch of sidewalk behind a few trucks where no one walks, because it smells like urine. Because you're basically walking through an outdoor urinal. These things... a local would know. So, that being said, to the broken sidewalks! And knowing where they are! And feeling completely calm walking into the street, dodging rickshaws and motorbikes and then knowing where the sidewalks begins again.
To my rooftop.
Epic. Not so epic before 4 pm. Then you'd be fucking crazy to go up there. Too. Hot. But after 4... you start to feel the ocean breeze. But it's still probably too hot. So let's say 5 pm. Roll out my yoga mat. Sun salutations, watching the sun start to fall. Watching it turn into that red, Indian sunset. I don't know what the deal is, why the sun here always turns red during a sunset. I've never seen anything quite like it, actually. There is this moment during the sunset here (and by here, I mean India, not Pondicherry)... the sun morphs from this yellow pulsing thing taking over the entire sky... into a single, red circle. It's like clockwork, how this happens. Always a red circle, with no rays. And I watch it, every day, from my rooftop.
To all the small things.
Friday, February 19, 2010
Sunday, February 14, 2010
Saturday, February 6, 2010
Unpacked
And just like that, phase 3 is over.
I unpacked my bag. Decorated my new room. Watched episodes of The Office online. I feel exhausted and very pleased to be in one city for the next month.
I'm back in Pondicherry. This city is so calm (by Indian standards); it's a great place to be settled. The house we're living in is pretty sweet. Two stories, with a big open room for sitting, 24/7 internet and skype access, a rooftop, cute wicker furniture, a kitchen... unlimited purified water! The best part is definitely being in an Indian neighborhood. No tourists. There are no hotels or guesthouses around, and there is no way I would have found a house like this if I were only staying a few days.
So where did I last leave off... ah, Goa. Seems so long ago. Like this blurry dream. Or maybe I was just in my own blurry haze...
Either way, I'm glad we decided one week of dancing with Russian tourists to psytrance was enough.
We took an overnight bus to Hampi from Goa. Juliana and I have definitely become accustomed to being in some seriously uncomfortable sleeping situations and not complaining... but you should have seen this bus. It was a "sleeper" bus... so of course, the photos any tour operator shows you are pictures of an actual bed in the bus. Obviously, one cannot take this seriously. The "bed" that Juliana and I shared was tiny. The two of us fit, like sardines. Perhaps a blessing in disguise, as the bus was freezing and I had only one sheet. So, we spooned.
Hampi is one of the coolest towns I've ever visited. It's in the state of Karnataka, which hasn't been hit by massive tourism - yet - and has this desert-like quality of Rajasthan... without the camels. It has a colorful bazaar within the town, but the once powerful Hindu empire it once was stretches on for miles in each direction, scattered with abandoned temples and boulders. Massive boulders. Beautiful, stacked boulders that make you think perhaps a giant piled rocks on top of each other to remember its hiking path.
Hampi was also the prime of Juliana and my silliness. Juliana and I laugh, a lot. It's one of the best parts about traveling together. We have a very similar humor and I think, more often than not, we laugh a little too hard. To the point that we're crying from laughter and people are looking at us like... what is really that funny? But we can't help it.
Sometime during the first month of travel, J & I talked about the potentially problematic situation of spending too much time together : we have no censor. No one from the outside world to tell you when we are getting too silly, when maybe we're being too ridiculous. Maybe you should buy that really big statue of Ganesh. Maybe you don't need to shower. From the start, I think we knew this point would come in our travels. Well... it happened in Hampi.
We found a guesthouse, set down our bags and headed to the rooftop cafe to fill in the necessary paperwork... which is when we met Simon. The enabler of our silliness. Simon is just as silly as we are. And he's British... which is, perhaps, the same thing as silly.
Simon laughed as we filled out the "police identification" section of the guesthouse's paperwork. We decided the best way for the Hampi police to identify me was "very sunburnt," and Juliana -- "safari shirt." This began our conversation about hat-wear and sun protection... which concluded with: Anna needs a hat.
By the way, the sunburn is not my fault. I was part of a sunscreen scam. I bought faulty sunscreen in Goa. SPF 50! I was trying! I lathered up and was not in the sun for more than a few hours... but... I'm pretty sure I just lathered up with just lotion. And I turned into a tomato.
So anyways... back to Hampi. We decided to get me a hat. There were a few shops in the main bazaar selling lots of hats, most not fitting my XL head. One, however, fit perfectly. It was a wide-brimmed straw hat with glittery lace at the edge. It was ridiculous. It IS ridiculous. But Juliana and Simon convinced me that it was ridiculous in this kind of fabulous way. And that I looked like I should be drinking sweet lemon tea and knitting while I wore it. And that IF this hat had a personality, it's name would be Maude.
Naturally, Juliana's hat needed a name. We decided on Gil. Gil subtlety disapproves of almost everything Maude does. If he had a celebrity look-a-like, it'd be Indiana Jones. Quite a duo, these two.
Thus evolved the beginning of the silliest four days yet. The three of us laughed about everything from Maude and Gil's adventures to our million-dollar idea of cat-shaped Cat-carrying boxes to tales of Dancing Shiva stepping on dwarves to Simon's custom-made Death costume. I don't think we stopped laughing for four days straight. Actually, that's a complete lie, but when we did stop laughing it was often for moments of ... Where are we? We spent our days exploring boulders and temples on foot and bike, constantly caught off-guard with these vast panoramic landscapes straight out of Land Before Time, or Jurassic Park, or The Flintstones. I think you get the idea.
I think I could've lingered in Hampi for quite some time.
We got on a train at 8 pm. Got off at 7 am. Got on a bus at 8 am. Got off the bus at 5 pm. Got on another bus at 7 pm. Arrived in Pondicherry at 11 pm.
This volunteering business is going to be challenging. Mostly because it'll be about self-motivation. This organization, Prime Trust, does not yet have an environmental branch, and I'm supposed to ... do that. Build some sort of foundation, or something? I'm pretty much in the dark here, but no one said an under-funded, somewhat disorganized NGO in India would be smooth-running.
We had some moments of wondering whether 3-4 weeks would really do anything here... if we could actually accomplish anything, or help anyone. And, we're paying for this opportunity. Paying to volunteer. It's a tricky subject, because one could see it as a mandatory donation to a worthy cause... or, wonder, why do I need to pay to volunteer? Especially on my budget. I'm getting a little nervous about whether or not I'll have enough money to last me through April 17th, so every rupee counts.
J & I went back and forth many times about whether or not we should stay here. But there was this one voice in my head, that persisted, no matter how many times I questioned if volunteering for this NGO was worth it. It was the voice of that shaman from Burning Man, who looked me straight in the eyes. Straight into my soul. He touched my forehead with his index finger, and said, "You need to stop thinking with this..." He moved his finger to my heart. "And start thinking with this."
So we're staying. I know this is going to be a really good experience. It feels much more like living in India rather than just traveling through it. Today Juliana and I did some domestic shopping. We bought groceries, toiletries... and... wait for it... INDIAN OUTFITS! Once again, no censor.
check out Prime Trust: www.primetrust.org
I unpacked my bag. Decorated my new room. Watched episodes of The Office online. I feel exhausted and very pleased to be in one city for the next month.
I'm back in Pondicherry. This city is so calm (by Indian standards); it's a great place to be settled. The house we're living in is pretty sweet. Two stories, with a big open room for sitting, 24/7 internet and skype access, a rooftop, cute wicker furniture, a kitchen... unlimited purified water! The best part is definitely being in an Indian neighborhood. No tourists. There are no hotels or guesthouses around, and there is no way I would have found a house like this if I were only staying a few days.
So where did I last leave off... ah, Goa. Seems so long ago. Like this blurry dream. Or maybe I was just in my own blurry haze...
Either way, I'm glad we decided one week of dancing with Russian tourists to psytrance was enough.
We took an overnight bus to Hampi from Goa. Juliana and I have definitely become accustomed to being in some seriously uncomfortable sleeping situations and not complaining... but you should have seen this bus. It was a "sleeper" bus... so of course, the photos any tour operator shows you are pictures of an actual bed in the bus. Obviously, one cannot take this seriously. The "bed" that Juliana and I shared was tiny. The two of us fit, like sardines. Perhaps a blessing in disguise, as the bus was freezing and I had only one sheet. So, we spooned.
Hampi is one of the coolest towns I've ever visited. It's in the state of Karnataka, which hasn't been hit by massive tourism - yet - and has this desert-like quality of Rajasthan... without the camels. It has a colorful bazaar within the town, but the once powerful Hindu empire it once was stretches on for miles in each direction, scattered with abandoned temples and boulders. Massive boulders. Beautiful, stacked boulders that make you think perhaps a giant piled rocks on top of each other to remember its hiking path.
Hampi was also the prime of Juliana and my silliness. Juliana and I laugh, a lot. It's one of the best parts about traveling together. We have a very similar humor and I think, more often than not, we laugh a little too hard. To the point that we're crying from laughter and people are looking at us like... what is really that funny? But we can't help it.
Sometime during the first month of travel, J & I talked about the potentially problematic situation of spending too much time together : we have no censor. No one from the outside world to tell you when we are getting too silly, when maybe we're being too ridiculous. Maybe you should buy that really big statue of Ganesh. Maybe you don't need to shower. From the start, I think we knew this point would come in our travels. Well... it happened in Hampi.
We found a guesthouse, set down our bags and headed to the rooftop cafe to fill in the necessary paperwork... which is when we met Simon. The enabler of our silliness. Simon is just as silly as we are. And he's British... which is, perhaps, the same thing as silly.
Simon laughed as we filled out the "police identification" section of the guesthouse's paperwork. We decided the best way for the Hampi police to identify me was "very sunburnt," and Juliana -- "safari shirt." This began our conversation about hat-wear and sun protection... which concluded with: Anna needs a hat.
By the way, the sunburn is not my fault. I was part of a sunscreen scam. I bought faulty sunscreen in Goa. SPF 50! I was trying! I lathered up and was not in the sun for more than a few hours... but... I'm pretty sure I just lathered up with just lotion. And I turned into a tomato.
So anyways... back to Hampi. We decided to get me a hat. There were a few shops in the main bazaar selling lots of hats, most not fitting my XL head. One, however, fit perfectly. It was a wide-brimmed straw hat with glittery lace at the edge. It was ridiculous. It IS ridiculous. But Juliana and Simon convinced me that it was ridiculous in this kind of fabulous way. And that I looked like I should be drinking sweet lemon tea and knitting while I wore it. And that IF this hat had a personality, it's name would be Maude.
Naturally, Juliana's hat needed a name. We decided on Gil. Gil subtlety disapproves of almost everything Maude does. If he had a celebrity look-a-like, it'd be Indiana Jones. Quite a duo, these two.
Thus evolved the beginning of the silliest four days yet. The three of us laughed about everything from Maude and Gil's adventures to our million-dollar idea of cat-shaped Cat-carrying boxes to tales of Dancing Shiva stepping on dwarves to Simon's custom-made Death costume. I don't think we stopped laughing for four days straight. Actually, that's a complete lie, but when we did stop laughing it was often for moments of ... Where are we? We spent our days exploring boulders and temples on foot and bike, constantly caught off-guard with these vast panoramic landscapes straight out of Land Before Time, or Jurassic Park, or The Flintstones. I think you get the idea.
I think I could've lingered in Hampi for quite some time.
We got on a train at 8 pm. Got off at 7 am. Got on a bus at 8 am. Got off the bus at 5 pm. Got on another bus at 7 pm. Arrived in Pondicherry at 11 pm.
This volunteering business is going to be challenging. Mostly because it'll be about self-motivation. This organization, Prime Trust, does not yet have an environmental branch, and I'm supposed to ... do that. Build some sort of foundation, or something? I'm pretty much in the dark here, but no one said an under-funded, somewhat disorganized NGO in India would be smooth-running.
We had some moments of wondering whether 3-4 weeks would really do anything here... if we could actually accomplish anything, or help anyone. And, we're paying for this opportunity. Paying to volunteer. It's a tricky subject, because one could see it as a mandatory donation to a worthy cause... or, wonder, why do I need to pay to volunteer? Especially on my budget. I'm getting a little nervous about whether or not I'll have enough money to last me through April 17th, so every rupee counts.
J & I went back and forth many times about whether or not we should stay here. But there was this one voice in my head, that persisted, no matter how many times I questioned if volunteering for this NGO was worth it. It was the voice of that shaman from Burning Man, who looked me straight in the eyes. Straight into my soul. He touched my forehead with his index finger, and said, "You need to stop thinking with this..." He moved his finger to my heart. "And start thinking with this."
So we're staying. I know this is going to be a really good experience. It feels much more like living in India rather than just traveling through it. Today Juliana and I did some domestic shopping. We bought groceries, toiletries... and... wait for it... INDIAN OUTFITS! Once again, no censor.
check out Prime Trust: www.primetrust.org
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