Last night I attended my first, and hopefully not my last Indian wedding. We started the evening by getting ready in our sarees that all of us had just purchased to make sure we didn't totally stick out ( I don't think it worked). Our host mama, Mumta was a doll and "drapped" all five of ours sarees for us. It's quite the task, one that I admire for so many of the women doing it everyday. We headed out, the whole family. Mamta, her two boys, her brother and father and the five of us girls. We all crammed into an autorickshaw and headed off. As we turned onto the street where the wedding was to take place we found ourselves behind the parade carrying the groom. While he was close it would still be over an hour until he actually arrived at the building. We walked into the building and was greeted by the sister of the bride who had invited us and welcomed us with open arms. As we made our way to the food several children came up to us to ask us questions or shake our hands. Trying to get food was a struggle. While most of us towered over the women, we were being beat out of the buffet area by good ole granny, I gotta learn to hold my own around here. After loosing my place several times I was finally able to get a plate full of delicious Indian food. We stood around in our sarees eating with our hands doing our best to tear the roti with only one hand, even though I haven't quite got the nack of it yet. And of course I slopped some sort of greese on my saree and than later some ice cream like dessert (kaulfi). At one point we were lead to a room off to the side to greet the young bride. She wasn`t allowed to take part of the celebrations and was meant to sit waiting for her husband. I can only imagine how nervous and terrified she was sitting there waiting to meet her husband for the first time infront of a room full of people, and she looked it. After that we were brought onto the dance floor by some of the brides sisters and then they just left us to dance to hindi music with a circle of people around watching. None of us know any hindi dance moves, so needless to say we looked helpless so some of the women came back in to help us out. We felt a little on display, but that was only to be expected. One the groom arrived at the building the music stopped and things started to quiet down. There were several ceremonies that happened along the way from the front of the building into the area where they would be wed. The groom and bride were still not permitted to see each other. It was interesting to see all the different cermonies that went on along the way, but I couldn`t help but notice that the room that had originally been packed full of people was now rather empty and the cermony hadn`t even come close to finishing. We all also noticed that neither the groom or bride smiled at all. I thought maybe it was a tradition to stay very serious, but our host mama told us that typically isn`t the case and most couples would smile. Once they threw flowered necklaces over one another the ceremony was over, they were married and we left. The whole process was not only different from what we would do at home, but also from what I expected an Indian wedding to be. We have been invited to another wedding early next week, so I am excited to see what the differences and similiarities are going to be. Plus I get to wear my saree again!
Friday 24 February 2012
The Sights, Sounds ... and Smells of Delhi
Oh what a great few weeks it has been so far. Goa was a fun, relaxing party time on the beach. Delhi... has been interesting.
For the sights I got the opportunity to be shown around the city to a number of must see monuments. Many of these places date back thousands of years and the history that accompanies them is pretty interesting. The thing I love the most about these places tends to be the attention to detail. It is almost unbelievable to imagine how these buildings were able to be constructed given the time period and the technology available to them at the time. True masterpieces. I haven't been to see the Taj yet, but I can only imagine how I'm going to be blown away once again. We've also had the pleasure of meeting some young locals who have taken us out around Delhi and we've gotten the chance to see Delhi in a different way.
To be exact, I spend my weekdays out in Faridibad, a suburb of Delhi and have gone into the city on days off. A typical day in Faridibad includes waking up to a breakfast of chipatti, roti, bread or some other carb. Then the five of us girls (2 Aussies, 1 Canadian + me and 1 American) and our host brother or mother take off to the school. The first sight we are treated to is typically 40 sets of eyes staring at us none stop. While the stares typically belong to creepy men giving us odd looks and at times comments, I really like when the women stare. It's more of a curiousity. I've noticed Indian people use a lot of expression in their eyes. In a weird way you almost have a conversation with an Indian woman just by looking at each other. It was however, slightly uncomfortable when myself and my 6ft 1in female Aussie friend stepped onto the women's only cart and felt the whole carriage staring at us. Their curiousity is quite cute though. It is not considered rude here, however, it still makes me very uncomfortable at times. Then we step on the busy street to see auto rickshaws, motorbikes and massive trucks zooming by us. En route it is not uncommon to have to dodge a cow, donkey or stray dog along the way. Along a particuar road there are multiple massive work ox chained to the ground waiting to get to work. And then we come to the garbage corner while we are just about to school. You can only imagine which animal loves this place the best, yup, PIGS! Typically there lies in the sludge one or two grown pigs and several little piglets. It's funniest to see when the piglets and puppies play together chacing each other around. As we pass this corner we are then treated to the sights of the children we will be teaching that day. They all approach us with a hand shake and "good morning ma'am, good morning ma'am..." until they've greeted us all. The kids are another fun sight of our days. In the mornings we work with between 5 and 20 children varying in ages in one room. Mornins are a lot quieter and give us the chance to work one on one with the children, often teaching them more challenging concepts. In the afternoon, things get crazy. Still the same small room, but over double the children, with every child trying to get their turn of attention by getting in your face, often shouting something in Hindi that I don't understand. Lets just say it gets noisy. The children have become famous in our minds for their constant "ma'am no, no ma'am" with a very serious face and the classic Indian head nod every time they are asked to do a subject or excersise they are not fond of. Ohhh the Indian head nod, something that is still confusing to me. It is a side to side nod that can mean a multitude of things like "yes we are in agreeance", "I don't understand you but I am going to pretend I do" or "you are saying something stupid, but I don't want to offend you and therefore I will agree". My guess is the last is typically the correct meaning in most circumstances when an Indian gives me the head nod.
As for the sounds of Faridibad it varies. My favourite noises include that of music, typically drums. In the evening there are parades going down the streets led my a large garbage like truck carrying a groom and his partying friends with speakers on the top blaring some sort of Hindi music. The truck is followed by a parade of men dancing, drummers thounderously drumming and then men dressed in funny looking suits carrying portable living room lamps. About every 20 minutes or so, fireworks are set off from the parade to produce a loud gun shot like bang. This happens every night, multiple times... tis the season for weddings! The hindi music blaring from cabs, rickshaws and store fronts is also quite charming, although can get over powering. But we are becoming more interested in the Bollywood music scene. The two young boys we live with constantly put it on and do the accompaning dances. We'll have to get them to show us their ways. Some of the girls are taking their love obsession to places where were not suppose to. Like in expat bars and top end locals bars it is strictly prohibited to request bollywood music, some of the girls have had to get reminders over the loud speaker that no hindi requests will be taken. The sounds I am not so fond of... the traffic. Holy moly people, if there is no where to move too, honking your horn isn't going to make them go any faster! Everywhere you go people are constantly honking. To me I would just stop paying attention to all the honking, but I guess every honk means something different. The worst honk is that off large trucks and buses. On our walk to school we are usually treated to about 3 or 4 loud, skreetching, ear paining honks from a truck right next to us. The honking I am becoming accustomed to, but the truck honk I will never be able to accept. And while the honks become fewer at night, they by no means cease to exist. Being able to sleep through the whole night in India is a goal of mine... not yet achieved.
Ah, now for the smells of Faridibad. What a glorious range. Walking down the street, past shrines and into shops you can be treated to the most beautiful smells of inscense. There is one in particular I am fond of, but I am yet to find it for myself to purchase. You of course also get the gorgeous smells of a mixture of spices coming from restaurants and street food carts. Our walk to school also boasts a variety of smells. While passing the cows and ox it is typical to smell the smell of a barn, but as a prairie girl that doesn't bother me. Occasionally wafts of urine work their way into my nostrils, especially in areas down by the metro station we catch into Delhi. On the way to school there is a particularly nasty smelling corner that is a combination of toxic varnish smells, welding metal smells and egg fart. Approaching the garbage and pig corner is another memorable smell that I think best goes undescribed.
Where we live is with a lovely host family, but it is rather basic. Even more so I've come to value the simple things. Like clean, hot, real showers (not bucket showers). We had the day off from school the other day so one other girl and myself went into Delhi to do some shopping that we wanted to get done. While cruising through her lonely planet on the metro I came accross the "activity" of going to the spa. After it was mentioned neither of us could get it out of our minds so we made an appointment for a deep tissue massage and later added mani, pedi to the list. It was glorious. After the massage we got to have a steam and then... A SHOWER!!! The women at the spa must have thought we were weird or something. I asked for shampoo and then we both took the longest hottest showers. I think we overstayed our welcome, but I have no shame. It had to be done. For three hours of blissful pampering after 4 months of travelling and volunteering, it was worth the 56 CAD.
My experiences so far in India have been great, and will only continue to change as I set out in a few weeks to travel around this miassive country. Delhi is a neat place to see, but I have a feeling India has so much more to offer and I am excited to see the changes as I change my location.
For the sights I got the opportunity to be shown around the city to a number of must see monuments. Many of these places date back thousands of years and the history that accompanies them is pretty interesting. The thing I love the most about these places tends to be the attention to detail. It is almost unbelievable to imagine how these buildings were able to be constructed given the time period and the technology available to them at the time. True masterpieces. I haven't been to see the Taj yet, but I can only imagine how I'm going to be blown away once again. We've also had the pleasure of meeting some young locals who have taken us out around Delhi and we've gotten the chance to see Delhi in a different way.
To be exact, I spend my weekdays out in Faridibad, a suburb of Delhi and have gone into the city on days off. A typical day in Faridibad includes waking up to a breakfast of chipatti, roti, bread or some other carb. Then the five of us girls (2 Aussies, 1 Canadian + me and 1 American) and our host brother or mother take off to the school. The first sight we are treated to is typically 40 sets of eyes staring at us none stop. While the stares typically belong to creepy men giving us odd looks and at times comments, I really like when the women stare. It's more of a curiousity. I've noticed Indian people use a lot of expression in their eyes. In a weird way you almost have a conversation with an Indian woman just by looking at each other. It was however, slightly uncomfortable when myself and my 6ft 1in female Aussie friend stepped onto the women's only cart and felt the whole carriage staring at us. Their curiousity is quite cute though. It is not considered rude here, however, it still makes me very uncomfortable at times. Then we step on the busy street to see auto rickshaws, motorbikes and massive trucks zooming by us. En route it is not uncommon to have to dodge a cow, donkey or stray dog along the way. Along a particuar road there are multiple massive work ox chained to the ground waiting to get to work. And then we come to the garbage corner while we are just about to school. You can only imagine which animal loves this place the best, yup, PIGS! Typically there lies in the sludge one or two grown pigs and several little piglets. It's funniest to see when the piglets and puppies play together chacing each other around. As we pass this corner we are then treated to the sights of the children we will be teaching that day. They all approach us with a hand shake and "good morning ma'am, good morning ma'am..." until they've greeted us all. The kids are another fun sight of our days. In the mornings we work with between 5 and 20 children varying in ages in one room. Mornins are a lot quieter and give us the chance to work one on one with the children, often teaching them more challenging concepts. In the afternoon, things get crazy. Still the same small room, but over double the children, with every child trying to get their turn of attention by getting in your face, often shouting something in Hindi that I don't understand. Lets just say it gets noisy. The children have become famous in our minds for their constant "ma'am no, no ma'am" with a very serious face and the classic Indian head nod every time they are asked to do a subject or excersise they are not fond of. Ohhh the Indian head nod, something that is still confusing to me. It is a side to side nod that can mean a multitude of things like "yes we are in agreeance", "I don't understand you but I am going to pretend I do" or "you are saying something stupid, but I don't want to offend you and therefore I will agree". My guess is the last is typically the correct meaning in most circumstances when an Indian gives me the head nod.
As for the sounds of Faridibad it varies. My favourite noises include that of music, typically drums. In the evening there are parades going down the streets led my a large garbage like truck carrying a groom and his partying friends with speakers on the top blaring some sort of Hindi music. The truck is followed by a parade of men dancing, drummers thounderously drumming and then men dressed in funny looking suits carrying portable living room lamps. About every 20 minutes or so, fireworks are set off from the parade to produce a loud gun shot like bang. This happens every night, multiple times... tis the season for weddings! The hindi music blaring from cabs, rickshaws and store fronts is also quite charming, although can get over powering. But we are becoming more interested in the Bollywood music scene. The two young boys we live with constantly put it on and do the accompaning dances. We'll have to get them to show us their ways. Some of the girls are taking their love obsession to places where were not suppose to. Like in expat bars and top end locals bars it is strictly prohibited to request bollywood music, some of the girls have had to get reminders over the loud speaker that no hindi requests will be taken. The sounds I am not so fond of... the traffic. Holy moly people, if there is no where to move too, honking your horn isn't going to make them go any faster! Everywhere you go people are constantly honking. To me I would just stop paying attention to all the honking, but I guess every honk means something different. The worst honk is that off large trucks and buses. On our walk to school we are usually treated to about 3 or 4 loud, skreetching, ear paining honks from a truck right next to us. The honking I am becoming accustomed to, but the truck honk I will never be able to accept. And while the honks become fewer at night, they by no means cease to exist. Being able to sleep through the whole night in India is a goal of mine... not yet achieved.
Ah, now for the smells of Faridibad. What a glorious range. Walking down the street, past shrines and into shops you can be treated to the most beautiful smells of inscense. There is one in particular I am fond of, but I am yet to find it for myself to purchase. You of course also get the gorgeous smells of a mixture of spices coming from restaurants and street food carts. Our walk to school also boasts a variety of smells. While passing the cows and ox it is typical to smell the smell of a barn, but as a prairie girl that doesn't bother me. Occasionally wafts of urine work their way into my nostrils, especially in areas down by the metro station we catch into Delhi. On the way to school there is a particularly nasty smelling corner that is a combination of toxic varnish smells, welding metal smells and egg fart. Approaching the garbage and pig corner is another memorable smell that I think best goes undescribed.
Where we live is with a lovely host family, but it is rather basic. Even more so I've come to value the simple things. Like clean, hot, real showers (not bucket showers). We had the day off from school the other day so one other girl and myself went into Delhi to do some shopping that we wanted to get done. While cruising through her lonely planet on the metro I came accross the "activity" of going to the spa. After it was mentioned neither of us could get it out of our minds so we made an appointment for a deep tissue massage and later added mani, pedi to the list. It was glorious. After the massage we got to have a steam and then... A SHOWER!!! The women at the spa must have thought we were weird or something. I asked for shampoo and then we both took the longest hottest showers. I think we overstayed our welcome, but I have no shame. It had to be done. For three hours of blissful pampering after 4 months of travelling and volunteering, it was worth the 56 CAD.
My experiences so far in India have been great, and will only continue to change as I set out in a few weeks to travel around this miassive country. Delhi is a neat place to see, but I have a feeling India has so much more to offer and I am excited to see the changes as I change my location.
Friday 10 February 2012
Mother India - the Adventure Begins
After leaving Dubai I arrived in Mumbai late in the evening. Spent sometime talking with some other hostel goers and then went to bed. The next day I decided to venture out onto the streets of Mumbai alone to see what I could find out about this place before I had to head to the airport. I wandered the streets, taking in all the traffic and honking, which was expected but still slightly overwhelming. While I got multiple stares from passers by, I did not get as many call outs as I had expected. And it was a welcomed change from constantly hearing "mzungu, mzungu", which was the case in Kenya. I ran into a few break downs of communication while trying to get a sim card for my phone, so I gave up and rushed back to my hostel to get my things together and head to the airport so I could fly down to Goa for a little beach party time.
After a little wait in the Goa airport, I was delighted to see some familiar faces from back home. Marc Deon, Thomas Siebel, Emile Nahachewsky and Brett Campbell all arrived, we got a taxi and headed to the famous Anjuna Beach area to search for a place to stay. We ended up getting two rooms from a hilarious indian lady who was constantly yelling into our rooms asking if we want pineapple, coconut, banana, water, taxi... whatever we wanted she was going to try to get it for us. We spent the night drinking Kingfishers in a restaurant on the beach. Once we got kicked out of there we heard the trans music that Goa is famous for and followed the sound to a packed beach bar and danced the night away until we stumbled home, somehow finding our place and crashing for the night.
The next day was a recovery day which included shopping! We went the the Anjuna Flea market which is a massive market full of women literally pulling you into their shops and getting you to buy their stuff with some persuasive tactics. There were so many beautiful things that I really just couldn't make up my mind on anything and ended up with a pair of alibaba pants and a skirt. After our shopping expedition we all felt good enough to take on Kingfishers again and found a fantastic treehouse bar. "Tantra" Was a three level restaurant with separate cubicles filled with pillows and cushions, complete with security curtains and ladders to get to the beds. Such a fantastic atmosphere, we had some snacks, drinks and wished Thomas a happy birthday!
The next few days were spent relaxing on the beaches, drinking beer and eating LOTS of curry and naan. Best food ever! We even rented scooters and took our chances on the open India roads to explore some other beaches. Of course given Goa's reputation for crazy dance parties there were a few late nights that took on into the mornings ending on the beach drinking chai and eating omelets made from one of the dozen women that sit outside waiting for party goers to leave. Not a bad introduction to India, but I kept thinking... this can't be what India is like, the boys assured me I was right.
My journey so far is one where I have taken risks, stepped outside my comfort zone and learn to do what it is I want to do. So, with a little encouragement from the boys and a visit from the famous Marc Jacobs (Marc Deon) I got a hair cut. Marc beautifully snipped off the right side of my hair down to the scalp so I am now rocking a badass undercut. Marc also put his personal touch on it by taking away my sideburn, thanks Marc...
Leaving Goa and the boys was sad but exciting. It was so nice to reconnect with people who I hadn't seen or heard from in years. India seems to have a strange way of bringing people together and bringing out the unexpected. It was exciting though, because I started to think of all the amazing ways that India is about to unleash her craziness on me. I can just feel like something great is going to happen in the most disguised way, I'm just waiting to see when this will come about.
I've spent the last week with 7 other girls doing some sight seeing in Delhi and Hindi lessons with our host, Dr. Bandhu. There are 5 girls from Australia, one from the states and one from Canada, Prince Albert Saskatchewan to be exact, can you believe it! There is even another girl we met at the airport doing the same program from Moose Jaw, what are the chances! I hadn't met a single person from Sasky yet and already in my program are two others. The old Indian architecture is amazing and beautiful, I love imagining how much work some of these temples took to achieve the beauty that they are even today. Learning Hindi is tough, but I'm hoping to catch on to more of it as time goes on. Today we get to see a Bollywood movie, I'm pumped! And then tomorrow I head to my new home stay and monday start my volunteer placement that is meant to be working with women. I'll keep ya posted as to how it goes!
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