Hey how about something NOT about India?

*This does have to do kinda with the theme of this here blog and so I guess I'll post it. I tried to fit paragraph summaries of some of my favorite stories (poor Korea turns into rich Korea, Bangladesh textiles appears out of thin air, Africa and poor countries selling their land to Korea) here in under 1.5 pages- yes this is a school paper. Also: those last India posts are a comin..



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According to Choson (ancient Korean) legend, there was once a dutiful son named Kang who prayed for 100 straight days to cure his sick mother. In a dream, a mountain god told him to find a plant with three berries, boil the root, and serve her the tea. Kang found the plant and used it to cure his mother, and, as legend goes, this is how the benefits of ginseng were taught to the Korean peninsula.

Great ideas and useful technology, such as how to cultivate ginseng, are things that have the potential to really help many people. Korea has a strong history of spreading such ideas, although in more modern times this has been done more with corporate partnerships and less with mountain god dream appearances.

In 1979, Korean garment firm Daewoo Corp. brought 130 Bangladeshi workers to Pusan. Daewoo trained the workers to create textiles with the most advanced methods of the time and over the next ten years 115 of these workers returned to Bangladesh to found their own textile companies. Before the Daewoo trainings in 1979, there were 40 textile workers in Bangladesh. Thanks to the Daewoo trainings Bangladesh today has a $2 billion garment industry, its top export.

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The South Korean government has a long history of promoting Korean farm production. Around independence, one of its first ever tasks was to quickly sell 1.4 million abandoned farm plots to 600,000 war displaced farmers. The going rate for an acre of paddy land was about four tons of rice (inflation was bad back then so the farmers paid the government with their crops).

Unfortunately, the number of people living and working on farms steadily decreased in the years following the rice for land reform program of the forties and fifties. As South Korea quickly developed a highly advanced economy, rural flight and the growth of industry meant less people living in rural areas and less land for farming.

Today, South Korea is the world’s third biggest corn importer. Only 1% of wheat eaten in Korea is grown in Korea. As increasing land prices and the decline of the Korean farming sector continue, the Korean government is once again getting creative to increase the nation’s food security. It is now lending money and giving technology to Korean firms planning on developing farms overseas.

Korean cultivation of 2700 square miles of land in the Sudan and 380 square miles in Tanzania are already underway. Similar plans are underway in the Philippines, Mongolia, East Russia, Paraguay, and Uruguay.

These rented Korean farm lands will produce corn, wheat, and other crops to be consumed in Korea. Some of the land partnerships will also be used to teach locals modern farming and irrigation techniques, create jobs, and spur investment for local schools and hospitals. Only time will tell if these foreign land partnerships will yield the same kind of successes the Bangladesh-Daewoo and Kang-Mountain God pacts shared before them.

Hooch

In early July, riots erupted in the Indian state of Gujarat after more than 150 people were killed by poisonous methanol. The victims had purchased illegal bootleg liquor sold by a local retailer named Harishankar Kahar whom new the 700 liters of brew contained a whopping 48% methanol (drinking 0.0015 liters of methanol can cause blindness). Incidents such as the July Ahmedabad hooch tragedy are common in India as most of the marginally and extreme poor cannot afford legally brewed alcohol.

There is a gigantic hooch trade in India, as government regulation and taxes on the legit alcohol industry are perverse. The sale of cheap, potent, sometimes-methanol-containing homebrew is a profitable trade- sometimes even for local politicians and police who are paid to forget the strict Indian hooch laws (Gujarat, for example, is actually a dry state prohibiting ALL alcohol sales.)

Our NGO, IDEX, works in many villages throughout Rajasthan. Some deal with such harsh, object poverty (think child malnutrition/starvation), that IDEX does not send its young foreign volunteers to see them. Our village is not one of these. Some of our families own motorcycles, some own livestock, one even has satellite TV! Chandyi Kheryi is by no measure posh, but it is my opinion that the residents owe thanks for many of their better living standards to the illegal liquor trade.

One of the things said to be 'keeping the Kanjar down' is the negative stigma that comes from their brewing of moonshine. I don't quite understand this as it seems to me that a number of regular Jhalrapatans and even local law enforcement are regular customers of the Kanjar brew (buying only at night, of course).

Before I go on here, let me say this: I know neoliberalism isn't perfect; if I took anything with me from my anthropology classes out to India it was a constant second guessing of the whole "we have to save these people from their current lifestyles" mision. I mean, is it possible that slum dwellers and the tradition-ridden rural poor are actually quite happy with their situations (or at least content)? Perhaps the best course of action to be taken isn't one of development and seeking to raise income education levels... but that's another post. For now, I'll just put on my economist hat and assume that developing the rural poor's markets and 'living standards' is the best thing Westerners (or at least young idealists) can strive.

So here's my question for IDEX and the residents of Chandi Kehri: Why not join the country liquor industry? The twenty or so legal Indian alcohol manufacturers currently sell 200 million cases a year, pulling in a huge chunk of change for the wet states which license and heavily tax them. Now I know it's not all that simple (remember that negative social stigma with alcohol makers? not to mention the whole caste system thing making it nearly impossible for a Kanjar to land a janitorial job, let alone a major manufacturing license for a so called poisonous industry; but again, this is the econ talking in me, not the anthro).


^I wouldn't recommend entering the restaurant business to the Kanjar. It's not that it's a notoriously tough gig, but that Joney's Cafe in Agra makes food too good to beat (he even cooks kimchi!)

Other small enterprise ideas I've floated for the Kanjar include operating tuktuks (easy market to enter, but little profit power there); running a bus (harder market to enter and find a niche route in, but more potential revenue here); and, my favorite, running public pools (think about it! I've seen loads of kids playing around big mud puddles but NO pools. Probably have to work around the whole women showing skin and most people not knowing how to swim issues but after figuring those out, it'd be a gold mine maybe).

Of course, the biggest issue with a public pool would be the extreme water shortages in Rajasthan. Though here too is a story for another post.


^The possibilities for private transportation are endless in India!


^Is striving for unbelieveable riches always the best path? Probably not (my humble midwestern roots tell me money ain't everything), but generating enough wealth to send your kids to school seems like a noble enough goal. Therefore, I encourage the marginally and extreme poor to create enterprises.

Example: Manufacturing disposable bowls for sale to street vendors. Filling a market need with a biodegradable and cheap product? Absolutely brilliant!! More on these genius little business ideas this winter...


See: "Poisonous Mix." Times of India, July 14

Daily Class Schedule

8:30am Catch bus out to village. Make nice with friendly bus conductor who is obviously proud to call us his daily customers.

8:50am Get off bus at water tower, walk ~half mile into Kanjar part of Chandi Kehri village. If its been raining, an eight foot wide stream raises in a mud bank that cuts across our walking path; makes for an early morning adventure trying to successfully cross it and get to class unmuddy.

9:00am Greet parents ("Namaste") and hug the excited kids who run out to see us. Set up tarp for the class to sit on, tattered black board, retrieve school supplies (notebooks, boards, chalk, tooth brushes, etc) from neighboring storage shed that is also used to house the village reserves of bootleg moonshine.

9:15am Walk with Rick and a few students out to well to fill a metal pot with water (bannee) for the kids to drink during the day. Later, a bore well would be installed in the village.

9:20am Brush teeth! Followed by morning exercises (head shoulders knees and toes, etc).

--First Lesson--
Rick and I teach half the class English letters, simple math, or simple English vocab. Sometimes we play games like around the world or whatever else we can come up with to entertain.

11:30am Walk the smaller children to other side of village for government subsidized meals at nearby public school. Get harassed by local school children. The purpose of our transit school is to instill skills and confidence within the Kanjar children in order to set them up for success at this neighboring public school. The rural public schools in India are run notoriously bad and I always wonder/pray the kids make it through to the school and benefit at least somewhat.


--Second Lesson--
Sohan or Sarochi Tailor teach Hindi or tell stories. The kids start getting antsy so we usually just end up playing games. The kids love to dance, hit each other/me, cheer, throw things, smile, jump around/be lifted into the sky/on trees by one of us ("mierdacool, mierdacool") and all kinds of things kids generally like to do.

~2:00pm Recess. Marbles, dodgeball, cricket, gaparti are always popular choices.

~2:30pm Try and hail a ride back to town. Can take awhile as the rare passing bus is usually packed to capacity and a half; though we always find a way to either squeeze in.

Agra

I find myself taking less and less pictures as centuries old imposing mountain scaling walls, monkeys swinging on old buildings, old men laying around on the streets, bazillions of little side store retailers, and kids riding 40 pound bikes and jumping off massive piles of rubble just don't pop out with that old wow I'm in India factor they did six weeks ago when I first got into Delhi. Sure I'll pause when I see a shepard guiding his sheep with a stick and talking on his cell; hold my breath when a bus is almost run off the road by a stray camel; and yes, even bust out my camera at first sight of a slum house with nothing but tires and dried shit for walls, but, you know, it's all starting to normalize with me.

^Our bus got held up by some slow moving elephant traffic. Naturally.

Went to Agra this past weekend. Highlights include a ten hour bus ride up to Jaipur, followed by a charismatic bus sales agent who hooked us up with a second eight hour bus ride into UP, and finding both a sweltering 108 degree midday sun and great views of the Taj within the Agra city limits.

Something I realized while in Agra: the Taj Mahal is big. Like really big. The pictures in every Mahm & Pahp Indian lunch buffet cafe stateside really don't do it justice. Tack on miles of ornate white marble carvings, inlaid gold lacing within said white marble carvings, and the three gate entryways each bigger than the Old Capital, and you have yourselves one of the (New) 7 Wonders of the World.




About the only other thing to see in Agra is the so called Red Fort. I gained a small victory here by hiding my eyes under my aviators and having to pay less than the 'tourist' ticket price (though still more than the Indian price... I had my own rate. The clerk was clearly confused.)

About the only other thing to do in Agra is go to the bars. We had a blast (no joke) at the clubs (all guys there, interestingly enough) and danced to 90's eurobeat hits all night long! My memories fuzzy, but I believe Bara requested 'In the Rhythm of the Night' about sixteen times.

After a 90 minute detour through dirt village roads, during which our bus knocked down a power line, we took the 8 hour journey back to Jaipur for a night- enough time to dine at the surprisingly upscale Pizza Hut, watch bad 90's movies at the comfy Arya Niwas hotel, visit a few forts while dodging the unbearable sun, and hop on the bus back to Jhalawar for Monday class.

Jhalawar

"And your name is?"
"Ahh; my name, Gopal."
"Oh, cool cool... are you staying with us now?"
"Two weeks, yes. I stay two weeks, and after going back to Jaipur."

And this is how I met Gopal, the 23 year old IDEX guide born in nearby Jhalawar, at the halfway point of our time here in India. A project executive who'd started working for IDEX only three years earlier and had been set into an arranged marriage only a few months ago (and had also found the time to become a yoga instructor sometime in there too.) Gopal had a sort of sophomoric sense of humor and cheated in carrom (Indian pool) that first night, buut he was always up for a game of cricket and was a lefty too.

Four years his elder and about as many times as mature, Bara Sigfúsdóttir, our new volunteer mate, had ridden the bus with him from Jaipur. The second Icelander I've ever met (both in Rajasthan!), she'd already spent a month in the country, and was on a sort of revisit tour after studying in Bangalore a few summers back. And while she'd also lived a year in Italy and was close to wrapping up a master's in philosophy, it's generally very easy to get along with someone who's a fan of both Muse and traveling, brave enough to travel alone, and able to see the world in a very South Park wise kind of way.

The first time we'd gone to the nearby district capital Jhalawar (Basically: we live in Treynor, Jhalawar is like PottCo's Council Bluffs.. Omaha would be Kota and that's two hours away) it'd only been three of us volunteers. This was on the third day we'd been staying at the house in Patan, and we should've known what was coming when some kids on the bus to Jhalawar excitedly showed us a Hindi newspaper article which featured a picture of us on the front page (headline: "THE FOREIGNERS ARE HERE" maybe?) The picture'd been sneakily taken by a reporter we'd passed the day previous while visiting the Kanjar villages and then printed right there for all in the district to see.

Once in the city, we walked around looking at stuff (oh wow, more tiny retail stores with the same cheaply manufactured things!) and trying to find our way to a fort which the locals were telling us was amazing. We slowly amassed a following of children walking behind us, which then became a mob, and eventually a general exodus of little Indians at our tail; screaming and shouting and pointing out directions to the supposed fort. We got lost in a residential area but walked on. The crowd grew. Fathers could be seen outside their homes pushing their sons towards us, urging them to shake our hands. Cries of "My name is?" (Translation: What is your name?) and "Which country?" and "What hobbies?" (These are the English greeting phrases taught in the schools) suffocated us. We walked by a school house and class was instantly dismissed as everyone ran out to join the march behind us. We ended up just giving up on our quest once to the outskirts of town and the fort still turned out to be miles away and we'd amassed, not exaggerating, a swarm of five dozen child followers surrounding us.

Our failed expedition still within our memories, it wasn't until that first Saturday after Bara and Gopal had arrived that we made a return to Jhalawar. The three of us, Rick, Saroji, Sohan, and Steena, one of the original Patan volunteers who'd recently returned from Denmark to do some writing on India, took a tuktuk to Jhalawar's Gagron Fort. And we actually made it there successfully.

We had a picnic, played some cricket, and generally enjoyed walking through the fort complex enjoying the sights (rapid capped rivers joining a hundred and fifty feet below the outer walls, old ruins, mango trees, shepards guiding their animals and talking on their cells, etc.)





Some other random things:

-We repaired the school roof in our village, Chandya Kehri. Financial backing came from IDEX and a few of the local families, a new currogated steel roof was screwed to a simple rod frame and the whole get up was then cemented to the school. It all made for a nice project and now we can all learn to read even when it sprinkles.




-The national holiday of Raksha Bandham was on a Wednesday a while back. The highways and bus systems were overloaded throughout the week as people everywhere traveled to see family (some of the young married off daughters of Chandya Kehri and nearby Kanjar village Jharel returned from their husband's villages too, much to the delight of their old friends and family). The main ritual here is women giving their brothers and brother like men in their lives bracelets called Rakhis. These are anything from gold to string with foil attached to plastic watches (some of the younger Kanjar children) to elaborate wrist bands (mostly adults). A reporter and three girls came to our house that afternoon to give us a traditional Rakhi and blessing (yes a coconut was involved) and sweets. The reporter, of course, was there to catch the photo op and Rick and Bara were featured on the next day's paper feeding each other the sweets. As Saroji was out that night with family, we celebrated with a pasta (sort of) dinner courtesy Sohan and Steena and made our own holiday traditions.

Just Do It

Where are all the Indian flags? Is it odd that I only caught sight of one the sixth week I was here or is it odder that I live in a country whose stars and stripes proudly stand guard outside of even Burger Kings and so I find a flag-shortaged country alien? While India has taught me a lot about America, it has also confused me on ideas like humanity.

I’m getting ahead of myself. Let me explain, as usual, with some amusing sights and scenes and then we’ll come back to the mumbo jumbo (at which point, you can tune out and just look at the pictures. I won’t mind; really).

Amusing sights.. let’s see…
Well there’s the fact that men here aged 14-29 tend to wear almost exclusively, even in the solar flare called Rajasthan, tightly fitting embroidered jeans. Could be just another Western inspired trend similar to the wealthy people in Jaipur fashionably eating at the Pizza King and McDonalds (which could be a manifestation of modern day self-inflicted cultural colonialism.. but again, the BS will be dug at only later so be patient). The top two funny-in-an-unsettling-sort-of-way embroidered jeans I’ve seen were both spotted by Rick while we were on buses and both featured embroidered ass pockets (the general area of which is frequently and uncomfortably close to eye level while riding the buses here.) One of them said, in swirly fancy golden letters, “ERECTION” on the right cheek and the other memorable pair read “Torture,” also on the money maker. I’m not sure how in tight and embroidered jeans currently are in America, but I know erection jeans and rear torture are always funny things to joke about.

The daycare across the street, numerous kid products (like the blackboard packages given to our kids), and the odd passing tuktuk features painted-on pictures of Mickey Mouse. Sometimes Mickey is even joined by an alternate-universe-Daisy, or a slightly-disproportionate-Goofy, and sometimes he’s even painted actual Mickey Mouse colors! (And sometimes he’s yellow.)


I’ve already typed about the importance of the Michael Jackson type, dancing (and on a grand scale, too) maestro, supposedly inspirational, ‘white’ character of celebrity; but in that same picture of the fake Michel Jackson backpack there’s also a fake Tom and Jery bag and next to it a fake Adidas one. Now while I’ve gotten somewhat over the initial ‘wow, just like in national geographic!’ factor of seeing rural women walking around with heavy things eloquently balanced on their heads; and I know fake name brands are everywhere in the world (yes, even in Iowa – Skeechrs, anyone?) but it never fails to strike me as odd whenever I see an elderly woman in traditional garb walking with a fake Nike duffel bag full of vegetables on her noggin.

Also: the swastika. No, it hasn't been appropriated here as it is used at home (Mickey Mouse means happiness to our children so the swastika should mean racism for your antisemitists too!) Quite the opposite, it is the West who ‘stole’ the symbol and so we should be the ones at the erection jeans butt of the jokes on misused signs. Far from its more sinister Western associations, the symbol here is one of religious calm. Peace, unity (ahem- which is why it was chosen by the aforementioned hate group), shanti, health: the ‘swastika’ (sorry I don’t know the actual name for it) is everywhere here, I can see at least two from where I’m sitting right now. It’s a shame I don’t have many Nazi friends because there is no shortage of cheap gift souvenirs here they’d go sahmayachhh for. Of course, I’d never tell them the ‘original’ meaning of the hateful tattoo they’d adorned their upper arm/chest/forehead with just as I’d never tell an Indian that Erection jeans are soo 2008. To each his own, I suppose.

And while we’re on the culture train, one more thing I’d like to slip in here before wrapping up would be marriage. Sohan, our camp manager, was married at age 10. Some students who’ve tied the knot: Raju, age 12, Chansingh, age 11, Maya, age 9, and Sunita, age 7 or so and who I actually remember noting as ‘one of the younger ones’ in my first in class written observations. Gopal, another IDEX guy who’d spent some time with us here in Patan, was married five months ago when he was 22. It’s becoming more common to put off marriage til the late teens/early twenties, but parental control is still the name of the game in the overwhelming number of weddings. For Gopal, that meant a light conversation one day that he’d be getting married the following weekend (for the record, “thanks mom and dad!” was not his response.)

Love marriages are on the rise, and I can’t help thinking that that’s only another sign of Western cultural influence. Could it be that the Bollywood stars imitating in quote and behavior the antics of Hollywood stars (the details on which are always explicitly covered on Page 2 of the Times of India) has in turn spurred the youth of India to act like the celeb loving youth of America? The simple explanations are that things like Mickey Mouse are universal symbols of childhood happiness that can be readily accepted worldwide and that the borrowed symbols offered in blue jeans and swastikas are basic examples of one culture taking in another’s flag and using it as a curtain. The cynical explanation is that true cultural hybridization/borrowing is a myth; that colonialism has today been replaced with cultural hegemony; and that the West now calls imperialism development of new markets.

I toy with each idea, those of an anticapitalist anthropologist and a culturally respectful economist. While the funnily inappropriate uses of borrowed images and societal themes are fun to point out, the bitter aftertaste of colonialism and the general history of cultural hegemony make me wary to congratulate the Indian who marries for love, eats Pizza Hut, and wears jeans.

The good news is that the sheer differences of views, especially on things we normally hold near and dear to our hearts (arranged marriage, name brands, crime, class, homosexuality, the armed forces, religion, etc.), have led me to accept that today’s mixing of cultures is probably not a sign of total domination of one by another. The bad news is that that still doesn’t explain why people would become angered up to violence on matters of gender rights, corporations, being gay (which is illegal in India, by the way), the military, and faith. Eh, I’ve got another week here; maybe the answer will come to me by then.

Portents and Pushkar

Two good omens destined our third weekend to be a good one before we’d even boarded our bus. I don’t whole heartedly believe in omens, but these just gotta count for something: we boarded a jeep for our morning commute and were waiting to drive off when a man walked by with a goat on a leash. I privately wished he’d get in the jeep with us and, as if the whole universe conspired it, he picked up his goat by all fours and packed into the back seat. I had a stupid grin on the instant I realized this was really happening and after a few ‘baaaahh’s Rick and Saroji couldn’t help laughing either.

At school, a massive rain storm came through and all but sapped whatever will to carry on our tattered thatch roof had left in its dried bamboo frame. Though roof repair, however badly needed, was put on the back burner as we canceled class in lieu of a nice mud fight. Back home, another good omen came in the form of a cow giving birth literally right in front of our house. Neighboring residents and random passersby gave the new mother water and food and chased away any birds, dogs, or other cows intruding on the young calf’s personal space or gifts.

The brown basin is supposed to be a lake:

Pushkar is one of the holiest of Hindu pilgrimage towns. They (Hindu legend) say that Brahma dropped a lotus flower in the desert and created a lake where it landed and devout Hindus are expected to bathe in at least once during their lifetimes. They (other travelers) also say the whole place is just great and the shopping is great as well. Today, Pushkar is a tiny town with 13,000 people and over 1,000 temples. A sublime atmosphere enshrouds the ghats (pools of holy water) and 52 temples lining the small artificial lake. The very closely surrounding mountains reenforce the whole secluded blessid setting the place has going for it. Pushkar is an amazing town. So amazing, in fact, that today’s Pushkar has taken on yet another dimension: backpacker’s haven. The community is loaded with tons of very holy things, quiet mountaintop views of far off forests and desert, and tons of very touristy things; all within walking distance!

The only tuktuk we took the entire time was the one from the Ajmer bus station, over a mountain or two (the little tuktuk that could), and into a pin drop quiet Pushkar at 5am Saturday morning. While looking for a hotel, we stumbled onto the legendary lake (it was dry but the surrounding temples and things still gave it a mystical sort of aura) and then upon the ghat where Ghandi’s ashes had been spread (“The Ghandi Ghat”).

We finally settled into the Paramount Hotel and sat watching out on the ‘Best Rooftop View in Pushkar’ as the fog lifted off the mountains and the tiny city of Pushkar was unveiled around the lake in the valley.

Later that day, we’d be conned by one of the local priests who basically drag tourists down to the lake and have them say a prayer, bless them, and then ask for a hefty donation. Having already read about these schemes (and not being a fan in general of profit off spiritually charged places) I politely allowed my forehead to receive a big red dot and went along with the priest as he had me stick rice to the red paint on my face, recite a prayer, throw flowers and water in the ghat, and chant softly to a coconut. But as soon as this was over and he asked, “ok now friend you must reach into your pockets; reach into your pockets and give whatever you can grab, just faith into grabbing in your pockets friend and give,” I turned on my game face. I gave him 100 rupees and tried hard to ignore the stories of the many other foreigners who’d just earlier given him 50, 80, 100 dollars (or euros, we will accept euros too friend) and refused any of his gifts (which were no doubt going to be followed with second donation pleas).

Pleased with myself for hopefully ruining a religion profiteer’s moment, I promptly went out and over spent on more Indian goods. One of the dress stores in Pushkar has a video feed running directly from the factory (sweat shop?) making their merchandise!

Also in Pushkar, at the delicious rooftopper ‘Rainbow Café,’ we met the first American we’d seen in India. His name was Dan, a 31 year old duuude from California. He told us he’d lost his job in January and had been traveling around Asia ever since. He’d had a blast in Australia, Indonesia, Singapore, Malaysia, Vietnam, and Thailand, but said India was the most varied place he’d been. It also turns out his former job is my current dream job: working in third world development at the World Bank in DC, about which he had some pretty cool advice to give. The guy had a really Californian way of talking and sounded tohtally bummed about his girlfriend, the bills, and an impending job search all conjoining in calling an end to his current world travels.

^I didn't know the Adidas logo was a trapezoid.

We climbed a big hill and sat outside a temple with an old saddhu man and his dog and watched the sunset over the town, my new favorite place in the world.


The day after we’d returned to school, our wait for the morning commuter bus was interrupted by a four man fist fight that broke out three feet behind us. I had wondered before whether or not Indian men were good street fighters, and based on the flurry of lower palm-to-back of head targeted blows the four various aged men were throwing, I can reliably say that they are not. One even picked up a nearby bicycle to try and use as a weapon. It wasn’t until he’d heaved it to about shoulder height that he must’ve remembered that bicycles in India weigh upwards of forty pounds (like the ones in America did a few decades back) and that it only made a useless and awkward obstacle weapon in an already quite awkward four-way fisticuff.

That night, our power went out (happens often) because a semi driver had backed into the power line outside our home (doesn’t happen often). While not as funny as the time we’d seen a monkey in Bundi swing on a line and rip it down towards the street in a shower of sparks, the near riot uproar of our angry neighbors was funny in its own way. The whole incident and, at the very least, the bicycle fighting guys were probably bad omens, but as I don’t whole heartedly believe in omens, I think we’ll be fine for the time to come. Hell, I had rice stuck to my forehead and sang to a coconut in Pushkar, which I believe cancel out at least a few of the bad omens.

Black or White?

The two boys living in the house across the alley are the friendliest people I’ve met in India. They will wait outside on their stoop until I walk outside, just to be able to say hello. On one of the first times we ever chatted, the older of the two (about eight or so) brought me a pen and a one page hand written survey. The questions on it were all the typical questions asked by any Indian making friendly conversation (“What is your name? What is your fathers name? Which country? Which village? What are your hobbies?”) and concluded with an exclamatory remark: “INDIA IS THE BEST AMERICA.” I’m not sure if this was supposed to be a threat, compliment, or assertive question, but I took it as friendly and we’ve been cricket mates ever since.

On one occasion, they invited me to their home to take some sibling pictures (their idea, not mine). They also tried to talk their mother or aunt or something into joining but she wouldn’t give in to their demands. One of their elderly women relatives (the extended family lives under one roof) kept making jokes to me and laughing. Camera shy relatives, yippy kid siblings, and a crazy aunt. Being twelve time zones away from my own family but making up for it somewhat by finding myself in the warm company of this one made for a nice afternoon.

Also, my neighbors are Muslims. I’ve been thinking hard, but I believe they’re the first I’ve ever met. Not that it’s all too surprising; ‘Muslims and Hindus are each brothers of mother India,’ as Ben Kingsley reminds us in Ghandi, but it’s probably more surprising that I can’t think of anyone else I know who follows the world’s second biggest religion.

They say India is the World’s Most Multi-Dimensional nation. In a land where 99.9% of the population would probably be considered ‘some sort of brown one’ by American standards, that diversity seems to stem from places other than race.

Religion would be one of those areas. Muslims are Sunnis and Muslims are Shiite. Hindus are Jain or Sikh or one of dozens of others. Christians come in all the familiar flavors. And while there are multi millennial old Buddhist ruins around here, I think they’re more predominant in the south.

Visiting the lakeside park and serene herbal garden in Patan, we once stumbled upon a big pink temple that was built before George Washington was a general. A large man then invited us to stay for the Hindu service that was scheduled to begin in a few minutes. He proudly proclaimed himself a member of the high status Brahmin caste and asked us our caste. At first, I thought he was joking. Once I realized he was serious and we explained that our country didn’t have castes, I could only sit and pretend he was joking. As more respectable looking Hindus filed in and sat on the marble floor (it was a very nice temple, maybe only high status folk can attend?), I wondered what privileges our host had inherited through birth, how he had probably lived his whole life justifying these birth rights with the caste system, and what he’d think of a society sans caste like the US. What would he think if that society told him the caste system was barbaric and should be abolished? Would it be fair to him for us to do that? (We do.) He’s only living his life the way his heritage has for millennia (one of privilege), but would it be fair to the Kanjar not to end that? There are over three thousand castes in India. That’s diversity.

The service consisted of lots of chants and clapping, a door that would open to reveal a golden statue and a guy who would hit a gong to the beat of the chanting, people bowing, a passing around of little tea leaves to eat, and hand movements coordinated with more bowing and eating of tea leaves. Everyone remained standing for the entire service. We then cleared out of the marble floored room and walked to the front courtyard of the temple, where we entered another room filled with bright tinted sunlight. Everyone began chanting again and then doors at the front of the room opened to reveal another big shrine thing and the same guy hitting a gong again. An automated drum machine was turned on and we repeated the whole ritual.

As a kid in weekly Wednesday night Sunday school, we were told that “Thou Shalt not Worship False Idols” meant that we shouldn’t pine over things like video games and new TV’s or bikes or (and this one was emphasized) Pokemon cards. In India, I finally see a truer picture of what the Bible was alluding to because there are A LOT of idols here for worship. In dug out portions of little retail store exteriors, makeshift alters street side, along the ends of the city walls, or just randomly painted things with rocks placed next to them, Hindu shrines are everywhere. Most aren’t as elaborate or impressive as the ones in the fancy Patan temple, but simply rocks carved into round stalactite like shapes and painted orange and covered with foil. I think praying to these in the morning and occasionally giving one of the larger ones an offering is a regular ritual for most. And while I don’t understand what about all this turned the early authors of the Bible off, I really don’t understand or comprehend the idols thing at all.


My favorite temple experience would have been visiting the hilltop fortress here in Patan on a rainy afternoon. Once there, it began to downpour and I was invited to sit on the steps of the elaborate (and somewhat gaudy) temple that had been erected within the decaying fort walls’ courtyard. I sat watching the rain and passing stray dogs with the plump fifty something Indian woman who’d been selling incense at a table before the storm. Not knowing each other’s languages, we just sat under the blaring speakers that had been installed on the foil-mirror plastered ceiling of the temple awning. In a scene that might be from a Wes Anderson flick, we shared coconut and sugar rocks while the awfully high pitched voices of the Hindi women singers drowned out the sound of the rain and the temple guru (who was shouting at his cell phone while sitting cross legged at a shrine inside.)


That fort had been built during the time when the Mughal, Rajput, and Muslim empires were continuously jockeying for control of north western India; conquering land, erecting great structures (the Taj, for example), and then losing the land to a rival empire who’d repeat the process. I think about the long histories of the things around me a lot in India, and the strange situations those things find themselves in contemporary times. How many invading soldiers had been speared off where the loud speaker control panel was now installed? Did the priest who charged his cell behind the Ganesh alter have ancestors who’d toiled under the hot sun to finish the Maharaja’s fort? What does INDIA IS THE BEST AMERICA really mean, anyways?

Bundi

With Rick’s stomach still a bit at ease, the two of us decided to take the shortish trip to the small town of Bundi for a quick weekend getaway. Along the four hour midday ride (we took the cheaper/slower/hotter/more crowded, but still pleasant, government bus system), I got a chance to see the closest major city, Kota, during the day for the first time. The city, like most of rural India I’ve seen, looked dirty and unkept. It’s not that I think all cities should mirror Pleasantville, but the public spaces there and elsewhere just seemed remarkably disregarded for a country whose government occupies such a massive part of people’s daily lives. The all over trash and tainted stagnate water reminded me of the numerous volunteer trash clean up efforts back home.

We dined at a fantastic rooftop restaurant (setting a weekend tradition we’d strictly begin following: they’re great places to meet other travelers, here we would find four Chileans on winter holiday). My pene pa sta with freshly made to mato sause (yet to find an Indian menu with under a dozen hilarious English errors) was excellent and I’d order it three times that weekend. We were approached by an only slightly sketchy man who led us to his nearby guest house, where we agreed to stay the night.

We woke up the next day to find we were right next to the base of the steep city palace/fort hill. We set off for the palace, which was still occupied by the current Maharaja but is semi open to the public. The views of the waking city were great and the foreigner entry fees were bearable. A great weekend was in progress.

We walked to the markets, stumbling upon some sort of street celebration where a DJ dropped beats through big tuktuk speakers and some guy in the middle of a dancing crowd threw out money and flowers. The markets, unfortunately, weren’t as exciting; just the same old same old shitty little retail shops you see every ten feet in India.

Made our way to the 84 Pillared Cenotaph, a 60 foot alter type thing. At the top of the steps, people were sleeping all about the cool floor (just like at the Patan temple) and on the highest open air platform were half a dozen twenty something Indian guys. The only people awake in the cenotaph, we talked (roughly through the language barrier) about college and money and phones and Indian/Westerner marriage and cricket and got the lowdown on being young in India.

Around this time, we decided to treat ourselves to a nice hotel. When told about our booking a two bed, AC room at Bundi’s largest three star hotel (with an awesome awesome pool) for only two thirds the going rate (because we were the ONLY customers and business is slow in the off season), strange guest house man kind of flipped and wanted us to pay for a second night anyways. Needless to say, we deliberately avoided meeting him for our preplanned fort tour that night. Things involving the guy were awkward enough.

We made the long hike up the hill, passing the city palace along the way up. The fort in Bundi is like a scene out of the video game Ico. Gigantic centuries old stone water reservoirs (you could fit a small basketball court in them) dot the complex along with overgrowth, crumbling towers, high walls, and walking paths on and along the structures. Save for two French girls and an Indian lawyer, we were the only souls around; a very surreal hike with all the huge ancient buildings around and all. From the fort level, you can see the entire city, along with the city palace ~150 feet below. We also ran into a few police dispatch workers who invited us up to the very highest tower (now used as an emergency dispatch center) from which you could see our hotel and the cenotaph, miles away.

Enjoying the view of the surrounding Jungle Book forests, we sat down on top of one of the higher towers and were then joined by three big monkeys. We kinda all stared at each other in a sort of old fashioned Texas standoff. Man vs Ape, they would all flinch everytime I'd make a sudden movement and Rick and I were both crouched and ready to fight for our lives if the damned dirty apes attacked. Rick took off his shoes and held them in the air. I clutched some gravel rocks I'd picked up at the base just for that reason and insulted them for never figuring out the wheel or fire.

In the end, we all cooled down and enjoyed the view together peacefully.

^The green courtyard on the right side of the palace is the same one as in the second picture above.