One Week, One Post

All right kids. I said I would back track, so here I go.

A few days ago I was sitting on the ghats minding my own business when a couple of guys showed up. Normally I would not have even let them talk to me, but for some reason I did. I made it very clear very early that I was not some dumb tourist and they were not going to get away with their normal crap. When a few minutes into our conversation they asked how old I was when I had my first kiss, I looked them squarely in the eyes and asked them if they would ask that to an Indian girl. The blushed and apologized. Go team.

I sat with the guys for almost two hours, talking about everything from math to marriage. They gave me their opinions on love and arranged marriage, told me about their lives and jobs, and asked me about mine. I had been practicing Hindi when they showed up so they helped me out, and I found out that they even knew Verindra Ji, my Hindi teacher, because they all live in the same neighborhood.

My first street food!

At one point another white girl walkd by and the boys reverted back to Indian maleness, catcalling her and being obnoxious. I yelled at them and they apologized, though to me, not to her. (Does that still count?)They never asked me for a hug or a picture, and right before they left they had me write down in my notebook the best Hindi phrases to get people to go away. They told me never to hesitate to use them on creepy boys, and they should work every time.

The next day Alex, Tania, and I went to dinner at Beck and Adam’s, our friends who live at the River Ashram. They are a newlywed couple in their late twenties and they are the cutest. They met when they were both working in missionary schools in Indonesia, and are now spending a few months in India. Beck is from Australia and the sweetest, blondest doll alive, while Adam is an Alaskan with dark hair and my kind of sarcastic humor. He is a breath of fresh air here, for the hippy culture is a little too politically correct and introspective for me.

Adam made a great vegetable curry and the best chocolate mousse I have ever had in my life. We spent the evening just chatting about home, family, future plans, and more. There were tons of laughs (mostly caused by me spilling things) and it was the most relaxed I have been in a while.

Friday brought a shopping day with the girls, where we all got great shawls and cheap jewelry. I got seven pairs of $1.00 earrings, knowing Safta would be proud. We went to Rahul Ji’s, our favorite shopkeeper and spent a million years there, just playing with his stuff. We had chaii made by wife, and I more or less took a nap on his floor. It was funny how much is shop felt like home after a long day of overstimulation.

Saturday was village day (see last post) and Sunday was spent at the River Ashram and watching the New Girl with some American friends

Baby in the cow food in the village

Monday was a crazy day in Varansi, for the Mela is ending and all of the pilgrims stop here to bathe before heading home. The ghats are filled with sadu tents, and tourists are everywhere. Because I needed to survey people for my research, I went out the Nitish, a field assistant with the program, and we spent three hours walking along the Ghats doing interviews. It was incredibly productive and incredibly fun. Since I was all the way downtown at the end of our walk, I stuck around for the Arti ceremony, and then walked home along the river in the moonlight.

Single most disgusting thing I have ever seen:

At this point in my life, when a cow stops in the middle of the road to pee I barely notice, so when one stopped right next to me last night and let it go I simply rolled my eyes. The man next to me was more intrigued. He cupped his hands under the stream of pee still coming of the cow, filled them up, and rubbed the liquid into his hair. He proceeded to use the moisture to style his locks. This is what we call devotion.

Tomorrow the program leaves for our spring break trip to Khadroho, so more about that later.

Things I hate:

• Western girls who don’t know how to cover up
• Men parading as Sadus, that are really just naked men covered in ash, who attempt to take advantage of foreigners and call me "sugar baby"
• People who are finding themselves
• The dogs that live in my house and are not potty trained. What is that all about?

Things I love

• Cheap Jewelry
• Street food
• Kheerkhadum and Ladu (Indian Sweets) and chocolate ice cream
• My tailor and his many birds
• The fist size puppy that showed up in the house last week
• The New Girl
•  the Aristacats 

Village Life

I have had the most incredible three-days of normalcy. In order to keep my head in order I am going to have to go backwards, starting with today.

Hand Loom for making Saris

When I woke up this morning I was planning for a relaxed homework day followed by some possible shopping. I had left something in the program house that I was going to need, so I stopped in for what I thought was going to be just a minute. An hour later I was in an autorickshaw with Sunder Ji heading to the village of the night and weekend watchman. The watchmen and his family had all been to the Kumbha Mela, and I was to go interview them for my research project.

We drove all the way across the city then right out to the village. The honking slowly died down and the gray and tan stone surroundings gave way to the greenest farms I have ever seen. Our first stop was to talk to a man at the local weavers, where I saw the handlooms that make the famous Varanasi Silk Saris. They were huge contraptions that take incredible skill to run, and while I did not see anyone weaving (they were to busy staring at me) I could hear them from the next room.

Watchman's mom (right) and someone else

After a cup of chaii we were back in the rickshaw and heading deep into the village in search for the watchman’s family members. The watchman has a big family, and lot of land and cattle, so we would have to trek all over the village to track them down. We started at his house where I met the two cutest old ladies, one of whom was his mother, and the other was… I have no idea. I also met his daughters, who were incredibly beautiful. There were mud huts and cow dung cakes all over, and the watchman especially wanted me to take a picture with him and his white buffalo, which I assume was the pride of his life. Over the next hour and half we hopped all around the village, gaining stares and research information wherever we went. It was such a nice change from the chaos of Varanasi. I was completely surrounded by the slow pace of village life, babies running everywhere, and green for the first time in two months.

Hay chopping contraption

Once we met everybody who went to the Kumbha Mela with the watchman, including two thirteen-year-old boys (by far the most educated of the bunch, and the only literate two) we went for a tour of the area. I was gifted guava straight from the tree and we took a nice long break to chew on sugar cane. Sundar Ji and I each got a stick that was three feet long and hitting it against a wood slab we peeled and sucked on the juice till it was nothing but pulp. After spitting out the one mouthful of pulp you could not help but go back for more. I managed to finish almost the whole thing!! ( I took some home to feed to elephant who is supposed to come to the program house on Tuesday) We were then offered sugar cane juice, but I could not manage more than two sips. It tasted like one of those wheat grass shakes, but nauseatingly sweet.

Three day old calf

The entire time that Sunder Ji and I were eating we had an audience of about 12 men and a few boys. They though we were so funny, especially when I finished my stick before Sundar Ji finished his. That being said, the three year old was kicking both of our butts.

After washing our hands we headed back, sticky, tired, and so happy. After a quick West Wing break, it was off to Chabad for Purim!

Seen in the Village:

• A three day old calf
• toothless people amass
• a boy in Ralph Lauren covered in dung
• Mud huts
• Beautiful clothes, and very well made
• People in almost no clothes
• Old women who did not seem to be able to conceptualize sitting and doing nothing
• More dung cakes then I can even explain, nicely juxtaposed under electricity and telephone towers  

Things you did not know about poop:

Cow dung piles under telephone tower.
East meets west, old meets new

• Dung cakes are used for fuel- I had dung heated chaii yesterday
• Dung is used for sanitation
• Dung is used for paint. It makes a beautiful brown color and the smell fades eventually
• When Dung cakes are on a farm they are set out to dry in a very particular order. The reason: So that if they are stolen the owners will know. There we have it folks: a poopy security program
• Scientists have attempted to create a cow dung powered car, but it was decided that it was too dangerous because it was too combustible 

Kumbha Mela: Achieving Moksha… Like a Boss

Sat, Feburary 16 1:36 pm

Kumbha Mela: Achieving Moksha… Like a boss

At six o clock yesterday morning I left my house for the experience of a lifetime. I was to meet Alex, Tania, Vidiay Ji, three of her foreign friends, and my history teacher, Professor Ojha, in order to go to the Khumbha Mela.

A little background:

View from the bridge above the Kumbha Mela

Once every 12 years a major bathing festival occurs in one of three places around India. The tradition is that this festival has been occurring since time immortal, sparked by the actions of Gods and Daemons eons ago. Every three years there are smaller melas, but in a twelve cycle the masses descend  to a specific point to spend a month bathing in holy waters, learning from saudues (Hindu holy men), sharing news, and simply being there.

This year was one of those years and for about a month the banks of the Allahabad, a city abut two hours a way from Varanasi, became the most populated area in the world. In a matter of months, a temporary tent city is built, and throughout the month of the Kumbha more then 100 million people come to bathe. It is the largest gathering of human kind in the world, bigger then all of the major cities you can think of. New York is a village compared to this. Politicians and peasants alike make the journey to the Mela, some walking all the way across India just to bath at auspicious moments surrounded by holiness.

There is a specific point where the river Ganaga, the river Yanma, and Saraswati, an invisible river that has sunk into the ground, meet. It is there that you will find masses of people bathing themselves in a ceremony that guarantees Moksha, salvation, at the end of their life. Simply bathing in this spot during the Kumbha Mela is enough to ensure your salvation, and release you from your cylce of rebirth. And so, a little after 6:00 am this motley crew of students, teachers, foreigners, and locals set out to be part of this incredible event.

The Mela 

We reached Allahabad at about 10:30 and set out to walk the four kilometers to the site of the Kumbha Mela. We joined the millions of others headed in that direction; people from all over the Hindu world. We still attracted attention because of our white skin, but for once people seemed more concerned about what they were doing than us. We walked for about 45 minutes in a never-ending stream of people and we ended up on a bridge overlooking the Mela grounds.

Procession of Sadu Sects

I have never seen anything like it. For as far as I could see in all directions there were tents of all sizes, people doing all kinds of things, vehicles of every kind, and everything else you might need to house and feed 100 million people. We walked to the middle of the bridge to get a birds eye look at the event, and saw part of the procession of the different sects of saudus on there way to bath. While regular people just walk to the bathing area, each sadu sects has its own truck, bus or tractor, highly decorated, with the main guru sitting on top. The sects bathe everyday in a specific order, determined by the power of each individual group.

Listening to the Sadu

We then went down the main grounds and set out in search of Proffessor Ohja’s cousin, who would lead us to the sadu tent where we would have our lunch. It took us almost an hour after entering the grounds to reach that point, but on the way there was so much to see. We saw the procession up close, every color and pattern of Sari you can imagine, people selling jewelry and blessings, cooking, eating, sleeping, sitting, and thriving in this feeling of absolute holiness. We saw a man who is said to have been standing on one leg for 30 years, a floating bolder, chain smoking female Sadu, and more naked men then anyone should every see. These are the sights that create the perception in the west about the overpowering spiritualism of the east. I almost felt as though I was in a novel about times past and places unknown.

At about 12:30 we finally made it to the place where we would eat our lunch, but first we sat down to learn from the head of the community. However, because he was speaking Hindi there is no way for me to tell you what he said. Use your imagination. After some chaii we went in to the tent and had the best meal I have had in India so far, simple lentils and vegetables, hand mixed with rice and eaten with your fingers. (Mom and Dad: remember how long it took me to learn to eat with my hands? Well, I reverted. Deal.)

Fun Fact:

There are two dogs that live with this Sadu community that have become such a presence at the Kumbha that they have their own space in the procession. Everyday they are decorated with garlands of marigolds, and they head down to the Ganga to bathe.

Lunch 

Bathing Point

After lunch we headed out again, this time to find the main bathing point, or the place where the three rivers join. On the way there, I decided that I was going to bathe, even though I promised myself never to step into the Gunga, a place that makes the Chicago or Genesee river look sparklingly clean. I managed to convince Alex and Brian, a 40ish alum of the program, to bathe with me.  Fully clothed, and with nothing to change in to afterwards, we plunged into the most holy water in the world, making everybody around us laugh to see the stupid Americans. But they were proud of us, and happy to see white people paying homage to Hinduism.

After my first dunk I stepped on something, and reached down to grab it. It was a bracelet, a bangle, with seashells on it. Some might say that it was just lost by a woman who bathed earlier; others may say it was a gift from the Mother Gunga. I say it was a hurt foot, but I kept the bracelet anyway. After spending sometime in the water, the three of us got out and a priest blessed the whole group. We set out to explore and come across the VIP area. This being India, we smiled at the security guards and climbed through a whole in the fence. That’s what we call security.

At this point is started to rain, so we made the trek back to the Sadu’s tent to wait out the showers. It ended about a half an hour later, and we headed back to the cars. We reached home at about 11, and I fell right asleep. I didn’t even take the time to wash off the Gunga, whose water made me both dirtier and cleaner then I have ever been in my life, depending on who you ask.

Brian, Alex, and Me Bathing in the Sangum

Achieving Moksha: if Hinduism is the world’s true religion I am in really good shape, although the fact that I said the Shehechanu when bathing may count against me. Or maybe not.

Monday Feb 18, 2:25 pm

I paid for that dip in the most holy but dirtiest river in the world. This saturday I spent all night with rivers of my own coming out if you get my drift. So all you white people out there: Be careful. 

Living Conditions

The whole crew

Muslims and School Busses

Life has been pretty normal since I last posted, and I am really into the swing of things here. I am officially a regular at my favorite café and I have developed a great relationship with my host parents. I have even planned a trip to Agra to see the Taj Mahal in April.

Alex,  my history teacher and I
at the first saint's shrine

Today however, was especially interesting. Instead of having history class, Alex and I went with our history teacher on a tour of Muslim Varanasi. We visited three places, each more unique and more foreign than the next. The first was the shrine of a Sufi saint (Islamic Mystic) where people come to worship. For those of you who are out there scratching their head and thinking “don’t Muslims not worship idols and dead people?” don’t worry, you are right. However, some sects of Muslims believe that while the saint’s bodies are dead they are straight chilling with God in heaven and they are alive somewhere up there. They are kind of like a secretary/ bodyguard to God, for you can't get your prayers to God unless you go through them first.

Things learned at first shrine: Muslims have very good hygiene, for they have to seriously clean themselves before they pray. 5 times a day.

We then went to the other side of the city to a mosque that is nearly 1000 years old. (Note: the “1000” is not a typo) This mosque was buried by in earthquake a few hundred years ago, and was only recently discovered, but it has been restored and is currently used by people in the area. If you didn’t know that this mosque had such an amazing history before you started looking at it, you would have no idea when you got there. It is just a building in a poor Muslim neighborhood, with no signs, and no tourist pamphlets. That’s what happens when something is only 1000 years old in a 6000 year of city, and something is Muslim is a country full of racism.

My Favorite thing about Varanasi Muslims:

Traditional Muslim women in full black Burkas strutting around town sporting sunglasses and allowing their neon colored and highly fashionable pants to show for about 4 inches by their ankles. They looked super fly.

Shrine of a Sufi Saint

Place number three was another Sufi saint, a baba that women pray to in order to escape the worst of their sorrows. Thursdays are the main day to pray to this saint so the place was a mad house. There was a swingset outside, and women everywhere! Our male teacher, a more traditional Muslim who does not frequent saint shrines, got confused and tried to take Alex and I into an area for only men. Thankfully, our white skin showed that we had no idea what was going on, so some other men directed us to the women’s section.

Things learned at second shrine: A significant portion of people who pray to sufi saints are Hindus, not Muslims, but because of the composite culture in India, and the similarities between Sufism and Bhakism no one really cares. Except for the people who consider making offers to saint heresy. They care.

In the Bus Rickshaw

After the tour I attempted to go to a Hindu Puja with Sarah and Tania, but it turns out the ceremony is tomorrow, so we did a little shopping for fifty cent earrings and decided to head home. We were bargaining with the auto rickshaw drivers when a man told us he could give us a good price. Figuring we would just take a bicycle we crossed the street with him, but when we got to his rickshaw we were in for a surprise. It was not a bicycle rickshaw; it was a school bus rickshaw!!!

The young kids in Varanasi get to school in these little covered carts pulled by a guy in the bicycle, fitting about 10 elementary school kids and their backpacks inside. It is adorable. Now imagine that instead of your usual 8 year olds in school uniforms you see three 21 year old white girls. We were in the school bus for about 20 min, and every other rickshaw driver we passed could not believe their eyes. The locals all thought we were hilarious, and the tourists were simply confused about what was funny. Rickshaws would pull up next to us to chat for a few minutes, and a lot of babies waved. It was the first time I actually enjoyed getting attention from the Indian crowds, because this time I deserved it. We looked ridiculous, and the three of us did not stop laughing the whole ride home. When I told the native Indians I spend time with  that I had ridden in a school bus even they could not believe it. They have never heard of any one who was not on their way to school doing so.

You know you have graduated from tourist when:

• When you start to head bobble without thinking
• When you step in poop, notice, then forget about it, cause it really doesn’t make a difference
• When the amazingly colorful and loud wedding processions start to annoy you.
• When you feel naked without your scarf, which you will use to as a towel or a tissue.
• When you see other forigners in shorts, tight pants, and v neak shirts and think they are grossly immodest
• When you have not gotten in the rickshaw or bought a puja flower from a child enough times that people stop asking
• When you have a favorite sweet shop (or three)
• When you forget your wallet when you go to a café, but they don’t care because they know you will be back.
• When you can tell when another foreigner is new, and secretly judge them, even though the differences between you two are a matter of degrees.
• When a 4-dollar meal feels like you are being cheated by someone and you balk at sweets that cost more than 20 cents.

Mommy Comes to India

Tues Feb 5, 9:47 pm 

Mom and Ruth left yesterday after a great weekend in Varanasi. It was so much fun to have them here. I finally had the courage to go into the art gallery I had been eyeing, and was able to get the wall hanging in my friends shop that he would not even tell me the price of (turned out to be $18. I love India).

But I am getting way ahead of myself. Mom and the girls, Ruth, Kay, and Mimi, arrived in Varanasi on Thursday afternoon as their last stop in a marathon tour of Northern India highlights. I cannot even comprehend the speed they went it. In like three days in Jaipur they did as much touring as I did in 6, though they did not have Hindi class four hours a day.

I met them as they were checking into their hotel, after taking an auto from my house. I was a little frustrated because I knew I had paid about 20 extra rupees (40 cents) for the drive over, but when I told the ladies that they laughed in my face. After spending the next few days with them, and watching them tip more than I pay for dinner I understand why. Their hotel was like nothing I had ever seen in India, and if it were not for the saris on the clerks in the lobby I would have thought I was in the US. It was amazing, and the food was even better. Meat that was safe and prepared well. I was in heaven.

Anyway, we met the tour guide the first night and went to the Arti Ceremony, which is a nightly ceremony on the Gunga, consisting of a bunch of attractive young priests waving fire and other objects in a circle. I had been meaning to go see the ceremony since I got here, for it is an incredibly important pilgrimage event, but I am happy I waited for the tour guide who was able to get us really good seats. At the end of the ceremony Ruth, mom, and I lit commemorative candles for Avi, and sent them into the Gunga, something that is supposed to be helpful in the next life. It was a very moving moment.

I spent the night in the hotel room with mom and Ruth, and when they woke up at 5:30 for their sunrise boat ride mom made the discovery that the headache I had been ignoring for two days was a fever, and I was actually sick. I had assumed if I ignored it it would go away, but I guess I needed my mommy to take care of me. She put me on antibiotics, and I spent the day watching TV.

When the ladies got back from their tour I took them out for their first time in the street of India without an official tour guide and a car waiting. I got five of us into one rickshaw, and they said they felt like real Indians, for they could not believe how close they were to each other. (Note: there are five passenger seats in an Auto, and it is really quite roomy. I have gotten in six before, and more is not abnormal.) I took them to their first non-government approved restaurant, and they met my friend Sunni Ji for spices and incense. We even found our way into a new shop, a place they NEVER would have found, for it required blindly following a guy into some allys, but it turned out to be a great find. Mimi and Kay were on their last day in India and they were able to get all of their gifts and last minute items in this store. I even got invited to a wedding (which I did not attend).

The next day Mimi and Kay left to go back to the states and Mom and Ruth switched to a hotel down in my part of the city. We spent the afternoon walking around my area, and we were all able to get some amazing folk art. Mom got this colorful wooden boat that is so large I have no idea where we are going to put it.

That evening, after a show put on by the program, the three of us went to my house to have dinner with my host family and the two other girls who live there. It was one of the funniest meals I have ever had, especially when I found out that the man I though was the grandpa of the house was not related to them at all. He was an old employee of their sari shop and was just visiting. It has seemed weird that he would get locked out of the house so regularly when he lived there, but now it all makes sense. I have finally solved the mystery of where he sleeps (the backyard)! They could not believe that I thought they were related, and I could not believe that they weren’t. My whole sense of reality has been altered. MIND BLOWN.

Sunday brought a chill day of homework, the River Ashram, and last minute shopping, but the real fun came on Monday. After breakfast at the program house Alex, Ruth, Mom, and I went to my host dad's sari wholesale shop and looked at the most beautiful hand crafted pure silk saris that I have ever seen. Because he is not a retailer, and the two saris Alex and I brought were not making his week, there was no pressure, just fun. We spent two hours oohing and aahing, finally picking out a few for him to bring home so that his wife could help us try them on for a final decision. I ended up with an electric blue one with silver embroidery. I don’t know where I will wear it, but I cannot wait for my first opportunity. (Shilpa… getting married soon?)

Finally it was back to the hotel to say goodbye. A hug and kiss later Mom and Ruth were on their way and Alex and I were back to the program house for lunch and homework.

Things seen on Hindi TV:

• The History Channel dubbed from English into Hindi, with English subtitles
• A carful of women leaving behind other women
• Hallucinating woman
• Grey’s Anatomy
• A dance scene a la Saturday Night Fever, but with an India man in his underwear.
• A group of teenagers one by one giving speeches in Hindi, but using a water bottle as a fake microphone

Things learned from Hindi TV:

• There have been 9 seasons of One Tree Hill
• Smoking is bad for health