WANDER AND WONDER

another blog for your reading pleasure...

2010-06-13T07:46:00.000-07:00

There's a new blog!

daybydayindelhi.wordpress.com

Check it out! Francesco and I are working on it together - our hopes are to post at least 4 snapshots/stories during the week of things we think about and experience in Delhi.....that way you get 2 perspectives in a short and crisp way - rather than getting bogged down in descriptions and adding pressure to us to write everything.

Hopefully it helps you to understand our lives here - and you can travel with us as we continue to explore this city!

Enjoy :)

A weekend trip...thanks to Saturdays off

2010-05-23T07:59:00.000-07:00

We went to Vrindaban and Mathura...

We learned that....

- There are monkeys with bad eyesight but good aim - one stole Francesco's glasses right off his head - and wouldn't give them back until we bribed him with a packet of biscuits and an Indian sweet.

- There are endless Sadhu competitions available in the two towns. Ideas include: trendiest all-white clothing, funkiest hair/mustache, thickest glasses, most creative forehead

- There is a magician (above) who uses a broken bottle as a telephone and claims to be able to turn me into an Indian man (my worst nightmare).

- What looks like a 10 year old boy working in a roadside food stall could be a 30 year old man with a wife and children in disguise - the lack of facial hair gives him away - he's just trying to avoid trouble for being a child laborer.

- There are as many stalls serving fresh, 'clean' water as there are people to serve it.

- There are rickshaw drivers willing to dig in the open sewer for a dropped lens cap to our new camera.

Pictures available HERE!

Lady Boss and Dada in India

2010-05-07T08:44:00.000-07:00

Lady Boss and Dada have come and gone - and survived their first (but maybe not last - they have 5 year visas!) trip to India. A clarification of names - Lady Boss of course refers to Mom and is the name given to her by our Agra auto driver who had extremely nasty teeth, very thick glasses and a clever streak. Dada is Pops nickname given to him by the children of SBT who thought he was my grandfather (I think its the white beard). Both names are in accordance to one of the many assignments I gave them for their trip - to earn nicknames other than the generic 'auntie' and 'uncle' most Indians use. Other things on the list of things that MUST be done in India were:

- Watch a Bollywood movie and learning at least one dance step

- Choose a favorite Bollywood hero (or learn a name and pretend he is your favorite)

- Try the following drinks: sweet lime soda, chai, lassi, ginger lemon honey tea, mango juice, nimbu pani...

- Understand the difference between Indian breads: chappati, roti, naan, kulcha, romali, banthura, puri...

- See the following animals without stepping foot in a zoo: elephant, peacock, camel, green parrot, monkey, white wedding horse

- Buy something for less than half of the quoted price (showing superior bargaining skills)

- Ride an auto on the meter

- Stumble upon a street wedding

- Active walk with the aunties and uncles in Central Park

- Take a ride in the super-modern and ultra-crowded metro

- Try a Maharaja burger from McDonald's

- Participate in a pick-up game of cricket

- Not blink when asked extremely personal questions within the first five minutes of conversation with a stranger

...There were others - I think Mom and Pops accomplished about 85% of them!

In short their trip was great - I loved having them here so they could see my life and what I do and where I go and how I live. Though I didn't dare take them on the bus, I did force them into some pretty seedy neighborhoods and pressed them quite a bit, especially at the beginning of the trip (part of which was bringing them to SBT!) They got to see my substandard working conditions (and my desk in the bookcase) but they also got to hang out with the kids a bit!

We spent one day in Agra, of course to see the Taj Mahal - but what we mostly found was heat and frustration....and the Baby Taj which Mom liked to call the Little Buddha (you can ask her what Buddha has to do with the Muslim leader who ordered the building of the Baby Taj - called so because it is physically smaller than the real Taj, though its more extravagant and was built beforehand – I have no idea of the Buddha reference myself ☺ )

Baby Taj

Pops soaking in the real Taj

And then we escaped to Goa - we found incredible beach shacks on a quiet (and warm!) ocean, watched the monsoon slowly come (in the form of clouds only, no rain yet) and endless seafood with which to stuff our faces. We spent lazy days laying in the sun and reading books, walking along the small beach, shopping for jewelry from the beautiful girls who come from Rajasthan to peddle their wares, and sleeping in hammocks. We also found a few Portuguese monuments and learned that during the 4 months of monsoon many Goans frog hunt. We also learned that many temples look like churches, many churches look like temples, some bones (and diamond-encrusted fingernails) scattered throughout the state attract great pilgrimages, and Goa is nothing like Delhi.

In pictures...

You can find many more pictures on Facebook and you can ask the nitty gritty details of the trip from Mom and Pops - I'm sure they have tons of stories about Indian stares, Indian dirt, Indian heat, and Indian spice - all the things that I'm used to by now.

I hope you are all well! Who else is coming to see us?

arranged marriage (gone wrong)

2010-03-28T09:12:00.000-07:00

So I won't make too many excuses - I know its been a long time (long enough for most of you to give up hope that I will ever update again) but I promise there are good reasons - the biggest of which is that we found a new flat, moved, and furnished it (which is a lot of work) - and it doesn't have internet...and we traveled to Bangalore for a wedding...

Since its been so long, the updates will be quick and then straight to a story!

- As mentioned, we have moved to a new flat...and we love it! Its a little bit closer to my work (so the commute is only about 35 mins each way now), in a nice quiet residential neighborhood but close to the best market of Delhi (I'm biased a bit). We are on the top floor with a HUGE terrace, two rooms, a bathroom (with a tub and a wall of mirrors, very rare in middle class India I think?) and a big kitchen (also rare - usually kitchens are quite small - perfect for servants). Another big plus is that there are windows in all the rooms (and again...rare in India!) Our terrace is now fully decked out with newly purchased plants and bamboo furniture. Unfortunately we keep killing the plants because the temperature has reached well over 100 F and they are all roasting to death (like me....we have no AC yet)

- A few holidays have passed - Holi (the festival of colors) which we celebrated at a university campus with other crazy young people and relatively little groping for which the holiday is famous, Ram's birthday (which brings with it a 9 day fast that of course we DIDN'T participate in), and at least a trillion others. Good Friday is coming up this week, and they even celebrate that!

- Work is going well. I have negotiated my way into having alternating Saturdays off (!!!!) in order to take a few weekend trips here and there.

- In terms of work, things are going well. Changes are happening - in my programs (for the good) and in the organization in general (for the good and the not so good). The most dramatic thing that has taken place recently is that one of the communities that we work in was completely demolished by the government in preparation for the Commonwealth Games. They are "beautifying" the city, which basically means using child labor and under-paid workers to disrupt the city to build new stadiums and roads, and bull-doze all the slums that might (or might not) be visible and where most of the laborers (and children) live. The repercussions for the residents are huge, of course, but things keep going and people keep surviving.
(here are a few pictures of some kids on demolition day playing with rubbish they found in the piles of what used to be their homes...)

- MY PARENTS ARE COMING TO VISIT!!!

Thats enough updates...for now....I double pink-promise to be a bit better. I can't keep up with all the things that happen all the time - there is too much to observe all the time and too much to take in constantly....but once my parents are here, I'll have my new camera and I can at the VERY LEAST update you with images!

...So now a story...about an arranged marriage in Bangalore.

We have a friend named Shilpa. Shilpa is THE MOST liberated Indian woman we (or anyone else in India) has ever met. She drinks and smokes and parties and has love affairs and sex stories (a 3 year long story which she was in the middle of when this whole mess started)...all with no qualms whatsoever. She is very genuine, unafraid of being who she is and doing what she wants. She's the type of woman that could approach the sketchiest of wine and beer shops in Delhi (which means any of them because they are ALL sketchy) and with confidence push her way through a sea of liquor-hungry men (and not a single other woman) and demand enough alcohol to get the whole shop drunk, and walk out without even thinking twice.

Shilpa's very conservative Hindu parents have been trying for years to get her married. She finally agreed.

How arranged marriage generally happens (as far as I can tell or at least in this case) is like this...

FIRST the parents save for years and years and stock up on all necessary 'equipment'. In South India that means GOLD (they consume more than half of the world's gold or something) and SILK (sarees of course). So Shilpa's mom, having only 1 child and a girl at that, has been putting many years, and a lot of money, into stocking up the best of wedding paraphernalia.

NEXT, even before getting your uber-liberated daughter to agree on even the idea of getting married, the parents contact a very official marriage broker. It becomes his responsibility to find suitable matches - according to religion, background, caste, profession, skin color, education, etc. And then....the eligible bachelors (having to do nothing themselves except exist) are brought one by one in front of the bride-to-be (assuming she has by this point accepted her fate) until she finally resigns and picks one (if she's smart like Shilpa, she picks the one who will interfere least with her current lifestyle, ie the most passive of the bunch)

AND THEN...the wedding. Again, the responsibility rests entirely on the bride's family. They have to arrange the venue, find the priests (and the priest's many assistants), hire a decorator, finalize a caterer (in Shilpa's family's case pure vegetarian, no alcohol), tailor clothing (also for the groom and his family), throw parties (engagement, henna, prayer, etc) and even rent a bus to transport the groom's family from the village to the city (again in Shilpa's case since the groom's family was from Mysore, three hours away).

NOW...the wedding itself lasts about 4 or 5 days (I think it could be longer, but Shilpa being Shilpa and silently rebelling until the very end, did as little as possible for it still be considered a wedding).

Sunday night was 'mendhi night' - which is basically the equivalent to a bachelorette's party as best as I can tell (again breaking tradition, Shilpa allowed men at her wanna-be bachelorette's party...men being Francesco). The bride and all her girlfriends get together for henna. The bride gets henna all the way up both her whole arms and as far as she wants up her feet and legs. Her henna should be the most intricate and takes about 3 hours to apply (!!!!). The rest of the women generally get more simple designs just on the front and backs of their hands - although, as is typical of girls, competition kicks in and whoever has the best henna wins - I noticed that its better if you go AFTER the bride because then the standards are higher. If you go before the bride (like I did) you never know what you're missing out on - as if being a white girl with henna isn't enough to make people laugh....try being a white girl with not very good henna. There are a few tips and tricks and myths about henna.

- The higher your body temperature, the darker the henna gets and the darker the henna gets the more you love your husband or husband-to-be. (The feminist in me sees big problems with this myth - why can't it be how much your husband loves you? And the practical side of me also asks, what does dark henna have to do with love to begin with?) Tricks to make your henna darker....1. Drink chai. 2. As the henna is drying, warm your hands over the heat made by roasting a mixture of
cloves and cinnamon.

- If the bride wants and the mendhi artists are capable (which any artist would be or surely they wouldn't be hired for such an important event), the name of the groom is hidden in the bride's intricate henna. This is again supposed to prove the wife's devotion to the husband. My theory is that it creates a type of icebreaker, so that the husband and wife, on their first night together (and probably the first time they are in the same place without any other distractions or family) they have something to occupy themselves to overcome their discomfort.

- Another privilege of mendhi night is that since your hands are completely coated in ooey, gooey henna, which you dare not mess up, someone is in charge of feeding you. Since Shilpa wasn't strict enough to disallow male guests, Francesco was there, to feed me the endless food, and give me drinks, and basically anything else I wanted. A few of her uncles were
making offers to feed me too, but I legitimately was allowed to behave like a spoiled princess and Francesco could do nothing but oblige.

The next big step of a South Indian wedding is the reception - thats right, the reception comes BEFORE the actually wedding ceremony. This is because marriage halls are rented for 24 hour time frames which start around noon - so since the reception is at night and the ceremony in the morning, they have to switch things up.

Contrary to what you might picture as an Indian wedding, South Indian receptions are BORING. I'm used to flashy lights and loud, annoying, un-rhythmic bhangra music of North India, the mobs of men dancing and sweating, the groups of women giggling and making excuses not to join on the dance floor, the mixing and mingling and undercover alcohol - South Indian receptions, on the other hand, are quite sober. Basically, the guests put on their best silk saris, wait in a big line with their families and friends, and parade one group at a time across stage to greet the (not-yet) married couple. You give them a gift (usually money), pause for the cameraman to take a picture, pose with your most serious face, go to the kitchen to eat, and then leave. No dancing. No singing. No sneaking alcohol. No disco lights and bhangra music. And most disappointingly, NO WHITE HORSE. Grooms in North India come to the wedding reception riding regally on a white horse, along with all their friends, family, family friends, neighbors, friends of neighbors, people they pick up on the street, in a big procession behind them. Its the stuff of fairy tales - princes (or creepy Indian men) on white horses coming to meet their true-love (who they've never laid eyes on before). Love at first sight and all that cheesy stuff. Not in South India. Just standing on a stage...

Last but not least is the ceremony - which again is rather long and drawn out and slightly boring. Before, during and after there were all kinds of other pujas (prayers) as well - to ensure the gods were pleased and the stars were inline and this and that and the other. The thing that struck me as odd was that the whole thing was planned according to 'auspicious' timing - basically according to the stars and the astrologist who reads the stars (also hired by the bride's family), one puja had to occur before 3:00 on the specific day. But the groom's family was running late and it was soon 2:45 and his mother and father weren't in sight (or in Bangalore). So they started without them - Shilpa and her mom and dad on one side, the groom and his....uncle and aunt on the other. Apparently its more inauspicious to start after 3:00 than it is to have someone pretend to be the groom's parents.

In all this (meaning the trip to Bangalore but also in general during our time in India as its hard to go one hour without some mention of marriage from someone, somehow) we heard a lot of theories about arranged marriage. People claim it has a logic, and even though Shilpa was an uninvolved bride (and even a rebellious one at times) she used to be the one who could rationally argue FOR arranged marriage (not to say she ever really WANTED it for herself). Basically she said that arranged marriage is just a way to narrow down the selection based on social capital. Given the vast number of people in India and the strict rules of social interaction between genders, it is close to impossible to choose ONE man for every ONE woman. It helps when each are involved in the same social setting - university or school or college or work - and then the couple can arrange for themselves. (Usually when asked if they had an arranged marriage or a love marriage, these couples will proudly reply, "both" as in first they fell in love, but then the parents approved). Otherwise, it is where parents (and marriage brokers) come in – they have the job of narrowing it down. It should be someone from the same background (READ: caste - although technically illegal it is still the biggest match-making criteria and if castes are unequal, even the pujas at the wedding will be affected) so that the couple-to-be naturally possesses similar views on raising children, spending/saving money, education, taking care of older relatives, and socializing with friends. The potential husband and wife would have been raised in a similar way and matched according to these strict criteria rather than 'love'. Of course, nothing is as black and white as that in India, and there are many qualifications OTHER than caste – sub-caste, village, profession, etc. – but the bottom line is matching social capital.

There are other logics that I have heard as well, but none as shrouded in academic reasoning. The funniest one being that an arranged marriage purposefully starts at the lowest point (not knowing each other) so that the relationship can only improve from there (I suppose as opposed to a western 'love' marriage that starts at the highest point - love - and declines into divorce and lawsuits).

This is certainly not the case with Shilpa. Super-free Shilpa's arranged marriage went terribly wrong very quickly. Within one week of her marriage, her new in-laws paid a surprise visit to her house. They pulled her aside and instructed her on how to crush up pills to mix with their son's juice every morning as they had been doing for the past 3 years without his knowledge. Apparently Shilpa's brand-new husband has been diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia and is being treated secretly (so that he doesn't even know), with no hopes of recovering any time soon. All the doctors who have been consulted claim that he will be on medication for the rest of his life and that he will continue to be unresponsive and need constant care.

Shilpa is filing for an annulment or divorce. In India its reason enough that he is so unresponsive from his medication that he is impotent BUT...hopefully she will sue the parents for misrepresentation and deceit and anything else she can think of. And hopefully, not only because all her mom's hopes and dreams were spent (in hundreds of thousands of rupees) on this one marriage, but also because she might finally understand a general downside of arranged marriage to begin with, Shilpa can return to her 3-year old love story and her independence.

That my friends is a story of arranged marriage - gone wrong - and somehow incredibly right again. Go Shilpa! FREEEEEEEEDOOOOMMMM!

a few (stolen) pictures and a lot of random stories.

2010-02-12T04:33:00.000-08:00

We still haven't fully recovered from the robbery - but we are working on it. We are looking for a new flat, have seen a few places and are determined to be slightly selective - because we deserve it :) We'll be somewhere else by the end of the month. Hopefully we will move somewhere a little bit closer to my work so my commute isn't as long, and Francesco can use our scooter for traveling to his job.

Speaking of scooters.....finally pictures (taken by Fanny, our old flatmate, who visited us for a week from Syria!):

I'm still too scared to drive....but Francesco has mad skills at navigating the streets of Delhi, flicking off other drivers, and honking his horn long and loud, ALL AT THE SAME TIME!

Work has been going really well - I'm making a lot of progress in my (two) programs and getting really cool things accomplished. I have successfully grown the City Walk to cater to over 250 people and raise over 1.25 lakhs a month consistently (thats over $2,500). I thought of, organized and helped to design a series of postcards, which will be printed and for sale soon! Here's a preview:

In terms of volunteers - I have over 30 right now (not including Corporate Social Responsibility groups who come in for day events only). Most of the volunteers are doing really cool things - from Korean culture workshops using chopstick games to English teaching, from multi-media courses to breakdancing, from medical checkups to drawing and art classes - they chose projects from the project list I have developed and I also have a resource of specific activities as well. To support volunteers also, apart from a weekly meeting, I have created, catalogued, and systemized (with the help of a volunteer :) ) an extensive library from which they can borrow books to help in their placement and in their general area of study.

I have also just started (with a lot of help from my good friend and long-time fellow SBT volunteer-plus, Nick) to create a research survey to do across all our centers and programs, to get detailed information from all the children willing to share. The project started with a simple request for stories of all the children - to be used for fundraising and marketing purposes - but we have expanded it to a research project that will hopefully give insights into the background of the kids - where they come from, why they ended up in Delhi, what their experiences were like before and after living on the street, how well they've adjusted to SBT, and how we can better develop them according to their needs, etc. We'll see how it turns out but I'm positive we will collect interesting information!

Speaking of SBT stories (and enough bragging) - I have a few simple ones for you.

-First, a link, to one of our "famous" photographers, one of the favorite success stories of SBT children at the moment. His name is Vicky Roy - he just had an exhibition opening at the American Center here in Delhi showcasing his photographs from the 6 months he spent in NYC documenting the rebuilding of the World Trade Center. He was one of 3 or 4 photographers chosen from around the world - http://vickyroyphotography.com/wtc.htm - the American ambassador spoke and as well as praising Vicky, announced that one of my City Walk boys, Brijesh, has been selected to study abroad in the USA in an exchange between community colleges and the open-schooling system in India (which is a bit like home-schooling in a way)

- There are two new boys at Aasra shelter home, where my office is located as well; I don't know either of their names. They come into my office everyday, one of them crying like crazy, claiming that he wants to go home, and the other shyly waiting in the background for notice and recognition. Slowly, slowly they are both changing. The crying king (lets call him Rona, for 'to cry' in Hindi) is bright and smiling, the tears being replaced by laughter. Every now and then you can still see concern cloud his face but with just a little bit of distractions (including drawing ships with sailors and cats with big whiskers) he forgets that he's trying to not enjoy himself. And the quiet one (lets call him Sharmana for 'shy' in Hindi), when given just a little bit of space, will start talking like crazy - about clowns and gods and trees and anything else that pops into his head.

Rona has taken to the computer. When asked what Shahadutt's laptop was he replied with over-confidence to hide his lack of knowledge that it was an 'ipod'. When he realized that wasn't correct, he tried 'China Mobile'. He has never ever been exposed to a laptop or computer before. Regardless of this, he had the whole thing figured out in 5 minutes, with the simple instructions to 'give a punch' to the mousepad and double click on anything. before anyone could realize he had pulled up pictures of half naked women and movies of bears fishing which he thought were dogs. He also tried to transfer his newfound knowledge to the desktop computer in my office. Ever so carefully he moved the mouse to be exactly in the center of every icon, then lifted the whole mouse and banged it down 2 times, giving the mouse a punch. I explained to him how to click - but took the mouse away from him before he could figure out how to destroy all our documents...

Sharmana lives a childhood of sweets and circuses. Everyday, without fail, he comes into my office and waits until I stop working for a moment and then ever so tenderly and patiently asks me for a ladoo (an Indian sweet). Everytime I say no and everytime he asks again. One day while doing some drawing distraction (I spend my best time doing drawing distractions :) ) Dev Ji (the coordinator of the Family Health program focusing on HIV/AIDS) came in with a bunch of red balloons. Dev wouldn't give one to Sharmana but he inspired an unprompted dialogue about taking balloons outside so they could float up and be with the trees and then they could keep floating and go close to Bhagwan (god).

Both of these boys also used to ask me for rupees - as if they were children at a traffic light (which perhaps they used to be). But now instead of asking for rupees, they give me biscuits...

- There's another boy at Aasra named Akash. He has a squinty eye and a clever streak. Yesterday I spent a few hours drawing a to-scale model of the shelter home to help with discussions on how to redo the center to allow more space for the children. He saw the drawing and immediately identified it as the center - with no hints of help from us (when Nick knew what I was doing and still had trouble recognizing it). Akash insisted on doing a model himself - and without prompts (again) asked for a ruler so he could make a scale. This 10 year old boy took his piece of paper, pencil, eraser, and straight edge and sat (or rather stood because he's too small for the chair) at a huge table, licked his lips, and tilted his head so his good eye was focused on the paper and diligently set about making a model of the center. He finished a day later and after all the drawing, erasing, redo-ing and moving offices from 'upar' to 'niche' (up to down) I have a very nice model which isn't so great with orientation but has an incredible sense of perception for a 10 year old. I think we have a future architect on our hands.

Akash is the same boy who sits in on any meeting I have just to be a part of a meeting, and seriously claims that he will first 'learn drawing' before shifting to the shelter for older boys to concentrate on education.

Also some events from the past weeks:

- I attended a two-day training conference (of which I only lasted a half day) on the resilience of children. I didn't learn anything about facilitating discussions with children to promote resilience, but I did learn that I am quite critical of freaky white people in India who can quote things like "the essence of our being is love" all day.

-Francesco and I attended the Jaipur literature festival with our friend Nicolas. We used his car and driver, and my connections (an SBT trustee produced the whole event) to have a nice, posh, delegate weekend. We survived the road to Jaipur despite the huge trucks driving as if they were scooters, and had access to unlimited food and wine, and books! We have quite a few new favorite authors and a collection of books we need to read.

-We also used my connections yet again (thanks SBT!) to attend a posh and exclusive opening to a whole new season of a TV show called 'I'm too sexy for my shoes' - we spent an evening mingling next to national TV personalities, having no idea who they were since we have no TV and gossiping with a fellow SBT staff in the corner :) I am no closer to understanding what the show is about....

-Friday was a holiday - one of the one million holidays in India - which celebrates the union of Shiva (the god) with his partner. Apparently to please Shiva on this particular day, one is supposed to graciously feed milk to a temple snake (sometimes figuratively and sometimes literally) because Shiva's mascot (so to say) was a snake worn around his neck. When I enquired about this tradition to a few (skeptical) Indian volunteers I have at SBT with questions like 'do snakes even like milk?!' I was greeted with very illogical explanations about how actually, scientifically snakes are allergic to milk and by trying to please the god, his followers are really poisoning his companion. Whoops....

I have other superstitions about solar eclipses and non-veg food, but I will get to that later. Also I was going to give you a few of the '60 reasons to love India' which was published in the newspaper for the 60th anniversary of the republic this year...but those will have to wait too because I'm awfully tired and I have another 6 day week ahead of me.....

the slightly discouraging start to the new year

2010-01-25T05:27:00.001-08:00

What happened:

I was at work, like any normal Saturday. Francesco was at home preparing for his trip to London. At 12:00 someone rang our bell and to inform that he was sent by the landlord to check the water tanks on the roof – the boy could have been any delivery walla, so Francesco directed him to the roof. Francesco left the house at 2:00 to run some errands, got a frantic call from a friend around 3:30 saying that our front door was broken, returned to the house at 4:00 and found both of the locks on the front door intact but the door itself ripped apart, our house gutted of all technology, cupboards emptied out onto the ground, completely ransacked. We lost Francesco’s computer, both our external hard drives (meaning EVERYTHING we have saved and backed up including all of Francesco’s masters work and PhD work, all my photographs from travelling the past 4 years, everything), both our digital cameras, every memory card for the cameras, both my IPODs, and our speakers.

What happened AFTER what happened:

Is even harder to handle. We called the police. The police came. Sir Sub-Inspector Vijay Kumar walked into the place as if he owned it himself, as if he was the most important man in the world. And our landlord was sitting by, waiting to see what responsibility he HAD to claim and what he could possibly get away with.

First, the questions – it happens when meeting ANY Indian and serves as a way for them to place you somewhere in the hierarchy that they automatically place everyone. Maybe it’s a throwback to the caste system, but everyone has people above and people below, and at introduction every Indian will determine where you are in regards to themselves. Being white puts us high in the scheme of things, since white people are naturally rich and educated (they know nothing about Southern United States). Even beyond being simply white, there are questions that people ask to place you within the “white hierarchy”. Where are you from? If you say Japan or US it means you spend a lot of money. If you say Switzerland there is definite respect because for whatever reason (probably Bollywood) Indians see Switzerland as heaven on earth. If you say Italy it means nothing past half of Sonia Gandhi (so no recognition of the Pope, as we tried with SI Vijay Kumar, and he could only relate to pizza and pasta – very educated police force). Then: Where did you study? The best answer to this question is London – it doesn’t matter the school and it doesn’t matter the subject – if you studied in London, its prestigious. And finally: What do you do here and how much do you make? We both answered NGO work – which usually gets respect because it involves “helping the people”. But then salary; it’s something I will never get used to, discussing money so openly with strangers (although its not really open since I’m convinced everyone lies). I told SI Vijay Kumar honestly that I am making an Indian salary and that we are living off that (we neglected to mention Francesco’s), and he was both shocked and concerned. We threw his expat vision for a loop – and to top it off we told him we had no maid or cook for the flat, so no chance of them stealing, and he didn’t know what to think.

After the questions are asked and answered, the power hierarchy is relatively established. There are a few distinct displays of power that I’ve noticed (in this scenario and others I’ve experienced here):

1. -having access to information and deciding to withhold it from everyone else (I could elaborate for days on this).

2. -having the ability to do as little work as possible, because we can get everyone else to do it for you, or just decide not to do anything anyways.

3. -having the privilege to FART in front of everyone.

The last one might seem a little ridiculous, but it happens in India. SI Vijay Kumar kept letting them rip (full-on leg-lifting) while in our house surveying the scene and asking his questions. But AS SOON AS he went back to the police station with Francesco to file the report (a fight in and of itself), the farting ceased. Francesco saw that he was nobody there, so far down the chain of command that he no longer had the position to be disgusting.

And then the attempt to insert logical thinking, a foreign concept in India:

SI Vijay Kumar ordered fingerprints to be taken, photographs were captured of our room and the mess that was left behind. He spent some time lecturing us for agreeing to live in a place with fibreglass on the door and lecturing the landlord for renting a place that was unsafe. Ultimately somehow he demanded the landlord compensate us for our losses (which will never happen) and give us more security (which is the next big fight in the chronicle). I suggested logical solutions to our awful situation:

1. -We could visit the neighbours and ask them if they knew anything. If the delivery boy was the one who stole everything (and used visiting with Francesco here as an opportunity to check things out, and then waited until he left to do the dirty work) then perhaps he was waiting outside during the day and someone saw. If it were someone from the neighbourhood itself, perhaps a concerned person would raise alarm. The police shot down this idea in order to not draw any more attention to ourselves (while the crime team was in the background nodding in amazement like it was an idea they had never considered!)

2. -We asked where the thief could possibly be reselling the technology so that we could go and see if we could find our things. We accepted that we would probably get none of the information and only the hard equipment, but at least we could be doing SOMETHING. It was only after mentioning Nehru Place, a market infamous for second-hand electronics, that the policeman batted an eye and agreed. How is it that we suggested the answer to our own question?

3. -And finally, if the police were so diligent to take fingerprints of the potential suspect right away at the scene of the crime, why did it take 3 weeks for them to return to take Francesco’s and I’s fingerprints to have something to compare the others to? What if we had moved (as planned) in that time? (By the way, for anyone who finds yourself in this unfortunately situation, expect to spend at least 3 hours getting your fingerprints taken – complete with an over-powerful policeman manually rolling ink onto a board, dipping each finger 4 times on each hand, and then your whole hand 4 times, and then your whole thumbs 4 times, and then getting the right hand and left hand confused, and doing some fancy folding tricks on a piece of plan computer paper. Its normal. )

The first suggestion brings into light the apathy I find among general Indians. I haven’t figured out a formula for when, where and how, but for whatever reason, when I’m most in trouble, and there are Indians in a position to help, they chose not to get involved. When I was on the bus and my mobile was pick-pocketed, I called the stolen number from my other number. The thief (stupidly) answered the phone and was talking in Hindi, saying things I assumed were important to understand. I kindly (and somewhat frantically) asked the man next to me, who I knew spoke both English and Hindi, to help me translate and speak to the thief; he refused as did the rest of the people standing around me on the bus. The policeman was displaying the same apathy – he assumed from the beginning there was nothing to be done and that past filing a report that will get buried in piles of paperwork, we could never expect to get anything returned to us in any form. He also assumed (probably correctly) that asking neighbours wouldn’t amount to anything because they wouldn’t want to be involved in someone else’s problems. BUT when a car accident occurs on the street, the whole road will stop and get out and beat the person who caused it. When there is a fight on the street, everyone who is around will join in. When you are “in” you are really in. When we told a few of our Indian friends and families what happened, they have vowed to get retribution and taken strong steps to help us solve our situation, sometimes by giving us a place to stay for a night, or a nice meal, or in bigger ways by pulling strings to find a new place to stay. This isn’t apathy at all but rather the opposite – and in a circumstance even further removed from the immediate situation itself, where they have even less chance to make a difference.

...to be continued...

We are still fighting with the landlord, despite ultimatums and shouting matches. We are still looking (unsuccessfully) for a new flat to live in, for just the two of us, in our budget and with a few of the precious amenities we have now (which of course don't include computers or cameras, but at least HOT WATER!). We are occasionally revisited by SI Vijay Kumar and company - to no avail. We have heard that this has been happening quite a lot in this particular neighborhood, across all the ex-pat flats here, so we are formulating theories about attacks on white people. But all in all we are managing.

In the meantime, any donation of music, movies, etc are appreciated :)

christmas in delhi

2010-01-10T05:23:00.000-08:00

first of all...i had pictures to support all the below statements...but my camera (and everything else) was stolen so words will have to do. the theft story is for another day...

CHRISTMAS IN DELHI

complete with a live (and skimpy) christmas tree, handmade paper chain ornaments, and decorations flown in from the states (thanks mom!)

-Christmas eve dinner at Swagth - a super posh seafood restaurant - we were accompanied by diplomatic expats and rich indians who had no idea it was Christmas eve

-opening ONE present on Christmas eve and then forcing the old torture tradition of the Hodges home on Francesco - to open all the others AFTER eating breakfast Christmas morning, WHILE STARING at them!

-the oldest, most stylish hand-cranked sewing machine in the history of India, and then subsequent thread shopping in our favorite messy market

-an endless cooking session with thomas, the rude german and anish, his silent indian friend. the feast included: prawn curry, grilled marinated kingfish and red wine mutton with roasted potatoes and fresh mozzarella salad. the seafood was from the newly discovered CR park - where all Bengali goodness is available, including a new favorite sweet called MISTI DOI.

-purchasing a beautiful HONDA ACTIVA automatic scooter from the suspicious seller at Karol Bagh - and successfully killing both my leg and the battery in the first night. and then joyriding through the streets of Delhi.

-a Christmas celebration with 500 indian children who think its the day to celebrate Santa's birth. complete with New Years decorations (because its all we could find) and a Santa suit worn with sunglasses, because Santa is THAT cool. also included hip-hop dancing and Bob Marley songs.

delhi delights.

2009-12-21T06:52:00.001-08:00

a few happenings of my delhi days...basically this post is just a big mix of random stories and statements. nothing much connects to the next, but nothing much around here does anyway...

for a while, everyday i would write one sentence in my journal about a crazy (or sad or funny or interesting or absurd) observation i had during the day. it saved on time (one sentence, that means like 2 minutes!) but at the same time allowed me to be more engaged and observant during my day - to look for that perfect sentence to write. i have since stopped (but should start again) - time has gotten away from me, and work has taken over and ive gotten sucked into the daily drudge - but i will share a few of them with you now - so you can know a few of the crazy (or sad or funny or interesting or absurd) things that i see and think daily.

-october 26: today i saw...a man absentmindedly (and QUICKLY) complete a rubix cube while riding the crowded bus number 460.

yesterday i saw....a bundar riding the back of a bicycle (bundar is hindi for monkey)

-october 27: today i saw...a street child with blood streaming down his face because of two self-inflicted wounds on his scalp, as a way to escape the police.

-october 28: today i learned...that indians put oil in dirty hair so that all the dust & dirt sticks to it and washes out easier - NOT because their hair already looks dirty so they are making it look dirtier.

-november 4: today it was confirmed...that in india, boys who sing alone on the streets are considered romantics, not lunatics.

-november 5: today i was mistaken for an indian, for the second day in a row...but this time was only an excuse for a boy to speak to me. if you want to know if i'm indian, why are you asking me in English?

-november 5 (yes thats two from the same day!): today i noticed that there has been a considerable increase in pet dogs in Delhi in the last year. francesco says they are killing off all the old dogs for the commonwealth game makeover. i say its just the next dimension to Delhi snobbery.

-november 17: some pending book titles - to be released when i have the time to (co-)write more than just the titles

GOLD, GHEE AND GULAB JAMON: A DISCUSSION ABOUT THE PUNJABI TAKEOVER IN IMAGE AND CULTURE

WINE, CHEESE AND CHAPATI: FRANCESCO & JESSIE'S DAILY DELHI LIFE

SAMOSAS & THEIR DISCONTENTS: HOW 5PM SNACKS CAN CHANGE YOUR LIFE

a story of street smarts (from sometime in early november)

background: the other day i stayed at the office late for a meeting with a few volunteers. while we were sitting around, a young boy, about 8 years old, comes in, fear and worry clouding his eyes, chin quivering, small twisted piece of metal as a homemade earring in his left ear. he asked, "when am i going home?" through thickening whimpers and heavy breathing he explained to us that he was from a village close to allighar and was sold by his parents just 6 days ago to a man promising him employment in Delhi. upon reaching Delhi, the man abandoned him on the streets. a different NGO picked him up and promised him and a group of other boys a picnic but when those plans fell through, dumped them on SBT with no explanation and bolted. the boy explained earnestly that he HAS to go home because he was the oldest of the 6 children and both of his parents are blind. that means that the sole responsibility of the whole family is resting on his shoulders and if he doesn't get home to cook for his parents they will "eat dirt until they die."

the reality: i saw the boy's father....and THE FATHER SAW ME. through a cloud of sobs and snot, the coordinator forced the boy to present me to his father. when i looked in shock between the old man sitting stoically on the stool and the young boy crying like crazy, i asked honestly, "ye con hai?" (who is this?) and the boy replied....."BAPU" (DAD). i couldn't be upset with him - and no one could be upset with me for believing him because we were both doing what we needed to do in the situation. he needed (wanted) to get home at all costs and i needed (wanted) to believe him and the innocence of childhood...and we both learned something too. he learned he could get home. and i learned street smarts.

and a final story to close:

i have made a few connections in SBT world - enough to get a response in case of emergency - for example - i was pickpocketed about a month ago walking from one shelter to another for a staff meeting. there was a huge procession going on in the back streets of paharganj with some strange sai baba wanna be surrounded by dancing boys in full makeup holding an umbrella over his head...bands everywhere, loud music, the whole works. i stopped to ask a shopkeeper what was going on and while one guy distracted me, his friend sneakily reached into my pocket and took my work mobile (thankfully nothing else). i didn't even notice until a little schoolboy told me after i walked away. clever. so i get to the shelter and have to skip the meeting (darn!) to go to the paharganj police station! imagine: about 30 police all with their feet on the table tops, laid back in their chairs, scratching their balls! so i go from one to the other, requesting a report, each one passes me down the chain of command to his subordinate until finally i am at the very bottom with no one else to get passed to and a very upset police man who has to actually do some work. connections kicked in - i call up the coordinator of childline (SBT's 24 hour toll free response phoneline for children in distress) who was at the shelter when i showed up after the incident - he knows all the heads of police - i give the police the phone and all of a sudden its all "haan ji. tike. kohi bat nahi. ji haaaaaan" and i get passed one by one UP the chain of command until im with the chief of police and his three stars and get a handwritten report (dictated by him and written by me - i have to provide my own pen!) within minutes! the best was that then i went back to the meeting - which i had never gone inside - and of course EVERYONE knew already what happened, they stopped the meeting to ask the details, and then CONGRATULATED me on receiving a very official FRI (First Response Investigation) report - as if it was a big accomplishment. handshakes and everything!

(since said incident, my phone has been stolen again...on the bus, from inside my bag...beyond being incredibly annoyed, i am disheartened by the communal trust - or lack thereof - between indians, and the intense apathy that indians show when they believe a problem to not be their's...but its a discussion for another day)

thats all for now. all this news is quite old - i haven't been good recently about writing anything - personal or otherwise - or even THINKING anything except sleep and work. throw in a mysterious skin rash that itches like crazy, and nothing much gets done. BUT its christmas now, and im taking a few days off, and i have high hopes of restoring my sanity. so stay tuned :)

MERRY CHRISTMAS EVERYONE!

(or happy christmas as they say here)

its been entirely too long

2009-12-17T09:10:00.000-08:00

so as you can see i've made some changes to the blog - hopefully i haven't taken so long to update that people aren't looking at it anymore. you will find some links on the side (right now they are mostly work links, but i will add more progressively to give a more comprehensive idea of my life in delhi).

as well there is a picture of ORCHHA - the village in UP that francesco and i took a weekend trip to. if you click on the picture its a link to a photo album (through facebook) with captions explaining what the pictures are (generally). as you can see, the trip was completely calm and relaxing - we didn't do much and we didn't need to do much - the best combination!

the other picture is francesco's brother's t-shirt design that he has submitted to an online t-shirt company called threadless - you should vote for his design so they will print it!

i am inspired these days to work on the blog...so there SHOULD be more posts coming soon!

update on daily delhi life aka WORK

2009-11-15T07:49:00.000-08:00

so i know its been a while...and i blame work of course. its hard to find time for "fun" when you work 10:00-5:00 monday through saturday, with an hour bus ride to and from work and a job that is much too easy to "take home with you"....i still haven't learned the skill of shutting off work when i leave the office (i blame mom....:) i have someone or something to blame for everything dont i?) its having huge effects on my mental health i think...and on francesco's as well.

just briefly what im doing for everyone who maybe doesn't have any idea (ill try my best, because at times i feel i dont' have any idea too!)

i am working with salaam baalak trust, an NGO that works with street and working children in and around New Delhi Railway Station. we have about 7 contact points, which are centers open only during the day for different types of children to use our facilities - they could be children without parents who have run away, been abandoned, or orphaned in Delhi, OR children who live with their families on the street but in rough conditions or in no house at all. we also have 4 shelter homes, for children who stay with us 24-7, meaning children alone in Delhi (for any reason) but who have decided to come off the street and join us. through all the centers we provide food, education (divided into three types depending on the level and capacity and desire of the child), arts and crafts, counseling, life skills education, fun, medical attention, etc....basically anything the children need.....once the child gets a bit older we encourage them to pursue a career path or attend university until eventually the child is independent and can support himself.

my official title is "coordinator of communications" (impressive, huh?!) but specifically i am overseeing the volunteer program AND the city walk program. City Walk is a guided tour that a british guy started at the trust about 3ish years ago that gives former boys of the trust a platform to simultaneously improve their english communication skills and raise awareness about life on the street. they lead a guided walk around the railway station informing (mostly) tourists about the nitty gritty and fun details of street life - what the children do for food, for work, for fun, why they run away, where they come from, what the dangers are, etc. and the walk includes a few of the centers of our organization so people can have an idea what is being done for the situation of street children. the most powerful part is that the boys will tell their personal stories - why and how they became street children and where they are now thanks to the trust.

for this program, basically i am overseeing day-to-day organizational stuff, but im also trying to improve not only the actual walk (and the guides as people and as employees), but the program itself, by setting in place certain systems and databases to keep track of contacts who come on the walk, using the databases for followup, general marketing to reach a broader audience, presentations and expanding the fundraising possibilities connected to the walk by creating a "gallery" of products made by our children for sale after the walk finishes. as well i am trying to create a "training manual" that can be used to train new guides of the walk, new boys of the trust that can use the walk as a means to become independent. all quite exhausting and exciting...

for the volunteer program, i am essentially starting from scratch, restructuring the whole program so that it is more effective for both volunteers and the organization. again im trying to put systems in place that allows me to gauge what the needs of each center are at any time, what the timetable is like, and even what specific children are interested in and need extra help with, that way i can match volunteers with the skills and interest directly with the center that would benefit the most. but this is all much harder than it sounds. first it requires the participation of every coordinator of every center/program within sbt....and for that i have to sensitize them to the benefit of volunteers and expand their notions of what volunteers are capable of. it also involves trying to apply people from all sorts of backgrounds, with all sorts of interests, and all sorts of time restrictions, to get done projects that by definition are undefined....what a mess. but slowly but surely i am working things out....

for now thats all. i just wanted to fill you in the background of what im doing...next time ill tell you some crazy stories...from work and otherwise. again sorry its taking so long between posts....a one day weekend is NOT ENOUGH - i haven't had even time to take pictures or explore or write or read or anything. sometimes i even think that i miss waiting tables because at least when you are done at night, you are done, no taking it home with you....but then i remember i used to have waitressing nightmares every night, so even that isn't accurate!

ill be back with more (and hopefully pictures too!)

take care everyone...i hope you survived the storm...everyone let me know how you are!

a video clip from calcutta

2009-10-25T08:54:00.000-07:00

we found these guys in a market in calcutta. i offered to help them....but they refused. good thing, because i didn't train to do the fancy centipede steps at the end......the rest, no problem!

a few indian observations

2009-10-17T23:47:00.000-07:00

first a few pictures from around town...

a boy using a saree tied to a fence as a hammock.

seller at jama masjid.

little street-side shrine.

....work is too crazy that im not going to go into it now...but soon i will write all about it....and all the issues it brings up, if you are interested....

for now...some delhi delights:

-last Saturday was Diwali. Diwali is the festival of lights, the day of Lakshmi, the goddess of wealth, the biggest celebration of the year in Delhi. the idea is that if you decorate your house bright enough, and if you leave Lakshmi a nice clean space with candles and flowers and things like that, then she will bring you wealth for the year to come. and to celebrate everyone in Delhi gets new things on Diwali: new clothes, new shoes, new sweets and new school supplies, everything new. somehow it feels a bit like christmas. houses are decorated like crazy with lights everywhere. people have a big holiday spirit with smiling faces and new shoes to match. and instead of leaving milk, cookies, and carrots for santa and the reindeer, they leave candles and a clean house. ooooohhhh...but the reality is so different. last night, on the cumulation of one week's preparation for Diwali, the city went crazy. what was nice and cozy "christmas" turned into a complete warzone. EVERYONE EVERYWHERE was putting of fireworks and lighting sparklers and exploding (figurative) bombs. the festival of lights became the festival of fire....walking down the street you had to dodge 5 year olds setting off rockets. even in the safety of your own balcony, you had to duck and cover any time a blackmarket firework exploded too low, right at the level of your face. and even with all the doors closed and all the windows closed you can still feel the constant boom boom boom in your chest.....

-no one at home would know this, but no one here can forget it: Delhi is the site of the 2011 Commonwealth Games. last time i checked there were 350 days left until they started. that means 350 days to expand the metro system times ten, 350 days to repave every road and every sidewalk, 350 days to build an entire stadium complex, 350 days to train every greedy rickshaw walla to use the meter when transporting people, 350 days to get rid of all beggars and all slums (nevermind relocating them somewhere more productive than prison). i personally believe it to be impossible (but incredible india is capable of many things)...but i have seen very definite efforts to get everything going. for example: the other day in the newspaper there was an article (front page) about how to make delhites less rude. the advice included things like: no honking your car horn when you're stuck in traffic (or any time actually) because when there are one million people on the road a horn won't make people go any faster, no spitting paan on the street because it leaves behind stains like shit, no burping in public because the rest of the world doesn't see it as a compliment to your stomach workings, and no pissing on the street because that is what bathrooms are for. what the article neglected to mention was "no scratching your balls in public"...its a very big problem, but maybe too explicit for the indian public.

-so until the commonwealth games come and the metro extends to the south (where i live), i am taking the bus to and from work. the bus in india is an experience in itself; it starts not to matter where you are coming from or where you are going, the important thing is the journey. like everything and everywhere else in this country there are one million people packed into a space for 10. there are arms hanging out of doors and heads hanging out of windows. people sitting and standing on top of each other, three people to a seat and one hundred to the aisle. the bus never stops at any designated stop but just slows down enough for people to jump on (on top of each other ) and jump off (and hope not to twist and ankle in the process). but actually what looks like chaos (as anything in india) has a system. there is a driver. he has two helpers to collect tickets. one sits in the back of the bus and one in the front. the one in the front jumps off as the bus slows down at a "stop" to make sure people are getting on and off, the one in the back puts his fist out the window and bangs like crazy on the side of the bus shouting the route in such a fast rhythm that only he understands. when the bus can again pick up speed the first ticket collector jumps back on and hits a few coins against metal and a signal for the driver to move his ass.

its one particular bus that taught me the routine. number 445, leaving from main bazar paharganj and dropping me just at the end of amar colony, about a 20 min walk to my house. the driver is a cute old man who is always happy to have me on board and drops me just at the end of the street. the number one ticket collector has an indian mustache and big smile. after the first ride he recognized me and knew exactly where i would get off. last time riding he even gave me a handful each of popcorn and peanuts from the roadside stall as we were waiting for the bus to start the journey, and he gave me a 3 rupee discount. the second ticket collector i dont know....but this bus has an additional member of the team.....a little midget who sits right behind the driver and doesn't do much except pretend to fight with people and get made fun of (in a friendly way) by the rest of his team. sometimes if he is feeling really brave he will attempt to call out the bus route at every stop in his squeaky 5-year old girl voice, but its rare. every trip is like a party on 445. the driver has an array of food and chai laid out on the dash board, at every stoplight he sits back and has a drink or a snack. the number one ticket collector also jumps out at every light and buys a cigarette or a drink or a packet of paan, walking around casually until the bus takes off again. and the midget in the background, yelling and raising his fists for a fight, with a smile on his face.

not every bus is a party though. usually, on any normal day, there is no problem.....but tricky indian men always mess things up. if nothing else the bus experience has given me a sense of women solidarity, even in delhi! as i mentioned before in calcutta there was big strength in women, because it was durga puja but also in general. women had rights to half of the bus and men were happy to give up seats regardless of whether it was a ladies seat or not. delhi too has ladies seats, but not so much because ladies requested them in a protest for equality and fierceness but because they pleaded for them to separate themselves from the mischievous men. the technique is to maneuver your way towards the window of a ladies seat, that way you know that the person beside you is also going to be a lady (and you have the breeze in your face). the aisle seat is risky....because you are seated, and the men in the aisle are standing...and with just a little bit of trickiness, a man's you-know-what ends up resting just on your shoulder. the man can blame the bouncy bus...or the man can pretend to be falling asleep standing up...or the man can be blatantly disgusting.....but there it is....a ahhhhem on your shoulder. if the bus is incredibly crowded, like usual, there isn't too much you can do. you could make a scene, but anyways there wouldn't be anywhere for the man to move to. but as soon as the bus empties out....mildly tell him "bhaiya toda piche jao"....and when he doesn't move a little bit backwards like requested hope that the auntie behind you in all her fierceness will tell him off in such a way that eventually the whole bus is involved and the man is embarrassed beyond words and you and auntie can share a common smile because you know how indian men are.

another bus technique for winning aunties is to offer your ladies seat to an indian woman older and more frail than yourself. upon exiting the bus she will pat your head and shoulders and give you big blessings, silently or outloud, and walk away super grateful to you for giving her 5 minutes of rest on the bus. and you will walk away blessed by an auntie.....

-and...last thing for you....there are a few new novelties being sold at the traffic signals around delhi. one is the claw like head scratcher that starts out looking like brain probes and expands around your scalp to massage it. i never thought anyone would buy such a thing...but actually i see too many indians walking around with them new in the box. its the new fashion. and the other new fashion (apparently) is fake mustaches and beards. ...and i guess people do buy them...because there is one now present in our flat.

scenes from the (newest) city i love

2009-10-02T20:04:00.000-07:00

so i realize that by now, every new city that i go to becomes my new favorite city. i know that....but this time its true! (i also know that everytime i claim that...whoops) but oh! calcutta! ...the india that ive always imagined...the india ive always pictured in my head....kind people, warm smiles, happy faces, delicious food, bright colors, crazy streets...everything that you could ask for.

so francesco and i decided sort of last minute to head to calcutta for holidays. he got off work the last few days of september and i didn't start work until the 5th october, so we had about a week to kill. we took an overnight train (17 hours total for about $20 each) and got lucky enough to get a cabin with two super sweet families, each with two children, a husband and wife. they shared all their food with us, and us with the children and by the end of the 17 hours we had become "auntie" and "uncle" (not necessarily a hard thing to accomplish in india, but a compliment nonetheless). the best was that first thing in the morning, as soon as i stirred, one of the fathers asked me if i wanted tea or coffee. i told him in a little while. and his response was...."oh yes, first toilet." hahaha...its a big indian tradition...they really dont understand life any other way. first thing you do every single day is use the bathroom. and everyone knows it.

we stayed in a relatively nice hotel, for a really good price. they were just finishing construction on it...so we had about one light bulb and a trillion empty wires leading no where. but it was in a great location. we didn't do too many things specifically except to roam around the city aimlessly. in the end it turned out to be the best. we stumbled upon little alleys filled with people outside washing clothes and feeding children and playing games and smiling with their whole faces. the children were super happy and would run up to us REQUESTING pictures...and want nothing in return! somehow, being used to delhi, we were so shocked and surprised by this simple sharing that we too were grinning in a big way. then the kids would go get their parents and grandparents and soon we would have pictures of the whole street. the only bad experience we had was in chinatown, where we were taking pictures of children, and two rascal boys decided to follow us afterwards and throw stones at us!

we also stumbled upon the best markets ever

....one market of glass bangles, tied in bunches of all different colors and sizes and designs. one market of all sorts of stationary and office supplies in bulk....clip boards and notebooks and pens and paper and paintbrushes....francesco and i ended up buying two sets of paintbrushes (one of which for his brother who stays in Italy...?), two notebooks, a clipboard, a small slate chalkboard (for what?), and a packet of receipts (just for the heck of it). there was also a whole street....of BANDS! boys dressed up in fancy uniforms of all colors, with ropes hanging every direction, dirt smeared everywhere even though they are supposed to look nice.

since it was the biggest festival of the year in calcutta (DURGA PUJA), these bands were for hire to march down the street playing music in a procession to the river, where each neighborhood, after 5 days of ritual prayers, would immerse their version of DURGA into the hoogely river (a branch of the ganga).

the first night we were there, we got to spend the evening with the family of one of francesco's coworkers from delhi. they took us to their neighborhoods "pandal" which are very impressive structures set up all over calcutta, with a frame of

bamboo and fabric stretched very tight around it, so in the end there is a temple in the middle of the street that looks like a real concrete structure, but is easily dissembled. inside each is a huge representation of durga, one of the hindu gods that in an alternate form is kali. the idols are made from the clay of the river. on the fifth day of the festival the idols are put into the back of a tata truck and paraded to the river and thrown in, in a symbol of the cycle of life; she comes from the river and goes back into it. the shocking thing about the whole process was that after the idols were floating out into the river, children would dive in and retrieve the extra

scraps of metal and gold garnishes and fabrics that decorated the idol and sell them to the people watching.

essentially though the festival is for women, which is super cool considering the male-domination of indian society. the second to the last day all the

women gather at the kali temple. they pay their respects to kali, the evil version of durga, and smear vermillion, a red powder, all over each other's faces, first on the part of their hair, and then on their cheeks. they put the same marks on the statue of the goddess. of course, being the token white girl, everyone was more than eager to spread vermillion on me, and i ended up completely, 100% covered in red, not only my face but my whole upper body. it wasn't until afterwards that i found out that to enter and participate i was supposed to be married...who

ops. but it was an awesome display of women solidarity and confidence, all these women in one place, fierce and powerful.

otherwise...calcutta has the best food (you all knew that was coming, i can't experience a city without experiencing its food!) - seafood everyday - shrimp curry and fish curry as well as the usual chicken and mutton and vegetables. we ate (of course) at all the best restaurants of calcutta, and we were shocked at how reasonably priced and unpretentious they are. we started formulating a theory, because such a thing would never happen in delhi. here the rich people like to prove their richness in the most obnoxious ways possible - having the shiniest car and nicest clothes and paying extremely too much to eat in restaurants that are completely kitsch and over the top. our theory is that what we dont like about delhi, and india by extention (but also all the things that we love about india) - the tackiness and kitschness and loudness and over-the-top-ness - is from the punjabis, the rich sikhs that come from the northwest, because they are known to like to showoff their wealth. and delhi is full of punjabis. whereas in calcutta we found that people prefer to show off their intellect as proof of their success. we found so many people just happy to share a conversation with us, and with a much greater sense of the world than ignorant delhites have. they seemed really aware of what was happening not only out of their own city, but out of india as a country, in the whole globe. and everyone walks around in super thick, super magnified plastic frame glasses, even the beggars, so its like a city of poor intellectuals stuck in the 30s.

we had a few meals at the india coffee house, a faded old building hidden in a maze of a book market, in the middle of a collection of universities. inside (every time we went!) were whole tables of professors chatting about important matters (we assumed it was important, and we assumed they were professors, it could have been just bored old people discussing how crap the coffee was), but it made for a very inspiring and stimulating environment. francesco and i planned a revolution of the world over 3 cups of coffee and toast and butter.

we did a few other things, little things here and there, always overwhelmed and fascinated by calcutta and its people. here are a few more pictures at least....

these are both (above and below) from the flower market, right next to the river, right in the middle of a slum. these people sit here all day and sell in bulk the garlands that the rest of the city resells to devotees going to the temple.

another shocking and entertaining accidental find! it took all of these men to lift this package (of what?!) and then four of them to carry it on their heads wherever it was going. they waddled away in unison like little ducks....i offered to help but they didn't let me....good thing.

a calcutta taxi, fully decorated and painted. we travelled a lot by taxi, they all use the meter...the formula is to multiple the meter by two and then add two cents. i have no idea why....but it still is cheaper than traveling around delhi. we also used the buses (all wooden), the tram, the metro, but not the rickshaws (because unlike the cycle rickshaws in delhi which have men cycling you around on a seat on the back, these rickshaws were just pulled by the men - a bit chinese emperor inspired)

one of the normal rickshaws, not the ones pulled on foot, but super decorated...

i tried paan for the first time - the chewing tobacco-type substance that everyone in india seems to chew and spit out everywhere, staining the whole country with a brownish-red spit. it was disgusting. i spit it out before i was finished chewing....and of course i was wearing white shorts and it got all over them. i need to work on my projection.

these were just two random children...with a nice bright blue background.

juice stalls! fresh squeezed fruit juice...any type. francesco got mango (the best) and i got mixed.

commit no nuisance

painting...

...and shaving

thats all. i apologize it took soo long to update. i got back to delhi and got caught up in the craziness that is having a new job in an organization that lacks organization! the first week was incredibly overwhelming, as well as frustrating and hopeless. but i have confidence that it will get better....

ill keep you posted.

the flat...

2009-09-23T21:04:00.000-07:00

in case you guys were curious to see where exactly i live....the apartment building from the outside. A-149

the view of our bedroom, from the front door, as you walk in. notice the huge desk, big enough for both of us to work, and the kite hanging in the window. i haven't tried my hand at flying kites yet, but its a favorite past time around here and apparently francesco is pretty into it. also notice our "shrine" on the wall in the corner. most houses in india have shrines decorated to a favorite god, to do prayers in front of in the morning or whatever. our landlord is an architect and we think this is his version. we have filled it with books (appropriate since we are both nerds, but we are going to put something different in it soon)

opposite the desk, our bed, with tibetan flags hanging above.

the tile mural inside our bathroom, just to the right of the bed in the previous picture. the american flag....and a map of the world.

our kitchen/living room area. the steps you see on the left are up to our bedroom.

view from our roof. we are one of the highest roofs around so we have a 360 view of the whole area, with two huge temples on the horizon.

and this is our amphitheatre style roof...completely crazy design.

thats all for now!

NAMASKAR

2009-09-22T22:41:00.000-07:00

so i finally made it to india, after the longest trip of my life....

i started off in norfolk at around 1 pm on sunday. i volunteered to be re-routed (TWICE) because the flights were overbooked. so i got $800 in US Airways travel vouchers (not bad) AND i got flown into the airport in london that i had to leave out of in the afternoon (convenient for me); previously i would have had to transfer through london from one airport to the next, with all my luggage, which wasn't a lot considering i am going to be gone a year, but still a giant pain in the ass. thanks US Airways....except the flight across the ocean was the worst of my life. imagine: a packed plane, heaps of crazy british being very particular about strange things, the last row before the bathrooms with seats that don't recline, stuck in the middle seat of the middle row next to a spastic british woman and a strange british male (wearing a top hat?!)....with no free alcohol and no screen on the back of the seats, only the big ones in the front of every section which only about 3 of 30 people can actually see. needless to say i didn't sleep at all.

i got to london around 11 in the morning, left my luggage at the airport and took the underground into the city, just to eat at my favorite little thai restaurant. seriously. i went one hour each way into the city to eat, on no sleep. typical :). the restaurant was packed but as good as i remember. its a little hole in the wall diner type place that serves cheap english breakfast during the day and authentic thai food at night. super cheap, super hidden, and super duper delicious. i took my time eating, and then walked the neighborhood for a while, it has a nice street market and a few bookshops, one of which was going out of business and had a big sale. there is nothing i like more than browsing books, especially on a full stomach.

then back to the airport to wait for my flight. already at the gate i could feel india. people recognizing other people that they know through friends of friends of the family, all heading home, catching up on family gossip, calling moms and dads. only a few other white people, either typical backpacking looking travelers, with long hair, loose cotton pants, and possibly a guitar, or proper business men in suits and ties and briefcases. and then there was me.....?!

the flight to india was the best. the airline is known to be the best in india...and its really true! right away they brought me a hot towel to wipe my face and hands, the seats are super comfortable, and everyone has their own tv with full control of the unlimited bollywood movie choices. it would have been easy to get a nice nights sleep, BUT the bollywood was keeping me too entertained, so still didn't sleep much. but even the food on kingfisher (the airlines) is good....AND they give you cloth napkins and metal cutlery wrapped in a ribbon! fancy.

flew london to mumbai and then mumbai to delhi with a 5 hour layover in between, during which i spread out on the floor and fell fast asleep, sort of almost missed my flight, but it was 40 mins late.

now im in delhi, in my apartment, which ill post pictures of later. francesco didn't do much to the apartment as he was waiting for me, so we have a lot of little things to do to make it feel like home. but i unpacked today and straightened up a bit....the space is really cool and the neighborhood is quite nice. i have about 2 weeks before i start working, but im a bit overwhelmed on the job front, i am going to have great responsibility with too many people telling me what to do, i fear. but hopefully my organizational skills will kick in in full force and i can transform the program and make cool things happen. i will update you all on exactly what the job entails (as soon as i know myself hahahaha)

so....you all know im safe. since i know you all have my blog address i will hopefully do a decent job about updating....but that means i need all you guys to post and email and keep in touch, because that is what this is really for. i want to hear about your lives too! love you all!

back to london and then gone again.

2009-03-24T06:57:00.000-07:00

i made it back to london (two new times by now) AND THE BORDER PEOPLE WERE SO FRIENDLY AND HASSLEFREE. too good. they have no idea how much they scarred me the first two times entering this country way back in october.

so being back in london is nice. its a different london than before christmas. francesco has a job which he works everyday from 10 until 6, which leaves me plenty of time to do anything and everything that i want or need to do....(or time to do absolutely nothing at all which happens more than id like to admit). and then by the time he gets off of work we are both ready to do something fun and something together. its nice; no more of this awkward position where we are both not working but not fully on vacation, suspended in a temporary place that neither of us can define. now its only me there...haha. but living like this does make london seem more real on a daily basis instead of just a big city that i MUST explore every day because im on holidays...

i do have a few projects going on....the biggest and scariest of all is the idea of a photography exhibition with some of my pictures from my travels this year. i have been selecting and printing some off, organizing, and stuff. i dont think ill be able to get it together for something i london (since im roughly planning on coming home the beginning/middle of may) but perhaps by the time i get home i can find some small coffee shop willing to display some pictures. any suggestions?

also...ive been to prague and back. my friend maria from university came for a week's vacation, her first time out of the united states! we spent 2 super quick days in london, and then went to prague for 5 days so we could explore a new place together. prague is amazing! the streets are small and made of stone, winding under archways and between buildings. the squares are full of life and surrounded by churches; the churches are inspiring in their grandness, with ionized copper spires/domes on top reaching towards the sun.

we spent two of our days exploring the castle on the hill, imagining dragons and queens living among the stained glass windows and old stones. we walked aimlessly through the neighborhoods surrounding the city center, hoping to find underground art scenes and the perfect chocolate store (maria is a choco-holic). we ate all the pork and cabbage and sour kraut and potato pancakes and bread dumplings that we could handle and we made sure to sample all the czech beer that we found. we listened to jazz in a cave and pretended we were rebelling against the communists. we caught big fat snowflakes with our tongues. we smiled at the czech people we met and they smiled back.

now she is back to new york and i am back in london. on thursday i go to portugal with francesco for a long weekend. then he makes a short trip to italy for an interview at a school close to florence for his phd. if he gets accepted....it means automatic funding and 4 years living in the tuscan countryside....and of course a super good school/supervisors. i am staying in portugal for a few extra days while he does that....i hear its warm enough to go to the beach...and i fully intend to take advantage as much as possible.

eventually i have to book a ticket home.....but its depressing....so im putting it off as long as possible. probably a bad idea.

here are pictures of prague (FIRST and SECOND) there are two links, make sure you see both! hope everyone is well....! and see most of you soon (relatively...whats waiting two months compared to all winter?!)!

and a correction

2009-02-26T13:47:00.000-08:00

i just realized the link before the one i just posted doesnt work.

so here it is again. you have two albums to look at now...

leaving morocco

2009-02-26T13:41:00.000-08:00

i am leaving morocco tomorrow. i have a flight back to london so i can hang out for a few weeks with francesco....and then my friend maria comes to visit! she is going to stay with us in london for a few days and then her and i are headed to prague to do some exploring in the city that is the gateway to other worlds! at the end of march i am taking another little trip to portugal (since afterall i didnt travel up the coast of portugal from morocco...my plans are always changing) francesco and i will go together for about 6 days.

thats that. i ended up staying in mirleft for 18 days and loved every minute of it. as soon as leaving became a reality though i decided i should see at least one more place before saying goodbye to morocco....i chose tafraout because i had heard such good things about it. i was a bit disappointed with it at first, it is dusty and uninspiring....but the last day it made a comeback when i discovered the vast valley behind the city and all the small villages hidden in the rocks.

here are a few more pictures of morocco....the album isnt quite finished yet so keep checking back for the last few added on the end.

second edition

2009-02-15T06:45:00.000-08:00

here is a second album of pictures from morocco. most are from mirleft, where i still am!

everyday i say ill stay just one more day...ive been here for a week and a half already!

hope you enjoy them

link for morocco pictures

2009-02-08T11:37:00.000-08:00

finally some morocco pictures for you. enjoy them....there are more coming (i know im always saying that but its always true)

so i am in a little town called mirleft now. it is the most perfect little hippie haven in all of morocco. seriously. there is one main street which is covered in sand. if you walk to the very end of the street and turn either left or right, depending on which end, and walk straight about one block you reach endless fields full of sheep and shepards and sheep shit. then you walk through the fields and you reach the cliffs that tower above the sea....and the rocks that are falling down the cliffs....and the waves below crashing into the shore. if you turn the opposite direction at the end of the main street you see endless countryside...dotted with small villages on the side of the green hills. and the kasbah, the old french fortress, on a high hill above the town.

needless to say its the type of town that sucks you in. i was planning on staying 2 days maximum but have already extended it day by day...eventually i think ill stay until at least saturday because in a neighboring town there is a camel bazar that im really curious to see (yeah thats over 1 week...and its for camels!). if i had thought of it sooner i definitely would have bought a camel and travelled around morocco just me and my spitting, bumpy best friend. tomorrow is the weekly bazar here in mirleft, the next day im planning on taking a day trip to a small neighboring town called sidi ifni which is supposed to have good beaches and good fabrics, and on wednesday there is a wedding in town that i might try to weasle my way into....which lasts 4 days! but anyway there is enough countryside here to keep me busy and enough beaches to explore...and enough sheep shit to step in! the people are super friendly and there is a nice little art scene too so im feeling inspired in many ways. ive been spending a lot of time writing and taking pictures...and studying the social networks here...putting my sociology to use in some independent research!

alright, back to uploading pictures! i hope you are enjoying them! email me anytime you want: jessieleighhodges@gmail.com

morocco

2009-02-04T04:27:00.000-08:00

so i know this has been a long time coming...and probably wont answer the millions upon trillions of questions that i know you all have....such as where the heck am i? what the heck am i doing? and if you're anything like me, what the heck have i been eating?! but ill try my best.

right at this very moment i am sitting in an internet cafe in marrakech, morocco wasting time before my bus at 4 to tiznit, morocco. it is a bit rainy outside, and yes, slightly chilly. morocco may be in africa but it does get cold in the winter.

so far i have been in morocco for about 2 weeks. on the ferry ride over i met a dysfuntional family from the states ( i cant remember how much i have written before so sorry if i repeat a bit). there was a girl, the mom, jessica, who was travelling the first time to gain inspiration for a book she is writing....a fictional comparative between conservative christians and muslims. she is 25 and a bit clueless about the ways of the world...she's an artist afterall....she lives in a dream world (not really such a good quality when you are travelling with two children in a muslim country). and the children! two girls...a 4 year old named shea who quickly became my best friend....and a 2 year old named reina who loves yogurt and cookies. we spent many quality hours playing pretend campfire, pretend fishing, pretend dog sitting, and real eating of biscuits. and last but not least there was adam, a 28 year old chaperone who is friends with jessicas husband. he agreed to go along, expenses paid, to carry bags, help with the girls, and do general planning. in the end he got the shit end of the deal because of previously stated characteristic of jessica....he had to do EVERYTHING! but he is a super cool guy who is really good at having nonsense discussions with hints of hidden important truths. we got along really well. me him and the kids.

eventually after breezing through northern morocco, i left them to pursue a bit my desire to find an NGO working with street children that i could volunteer with for a few months. i had already started contacting one in casablanca and they seemed enthusiastic about having me on board. BUT there was a catch. i had been having francesco help me email them in french....basically he was writing all the emails and translating the ones they sent back. i looked them up in casa and went to visit their sites and when they realized i couldnt speak french it turned into a disaster. no one there really spoke english since french is the administrative language here (morocco was colonized by the french). actually the only people who speak english are the ones working directly with the tourist industry. soooo...in the end i think this particular NGO wont work out. i did visit the shelter home while i was there and i think it would have been really interesting in terms of comparing their strategies to the ones used by the NGO in india...BUT oh well. there are a few other opportunities on the horizon, so i will keep my fingers crossed.

the other big news is that francesco came to visit for a long weekend. ha...such a globetrotting couple we are. we spent the day he got here and the day before he left in the main, big tourist city of marrakech. it is exactly what you want from morocco...snake charmers, belly dancing transvestites, couscous, tajines, huge endless bazars selling lamps and tea sets and carpets and any other kitch moroccan thing you can think of, mint tea, henna tattoos, a medina of small streets and bright colors, dust, donkey carts, honking traffic, pointy hooded-KKK looking cloaks (called jellabas), berbers, blissful tiled guesthouses, etc etc. its the traditional morocco turned over the top for the tourists...so that now its hard to know if its like this in spite of the tourists or because of the tourists. BUT THEN we also discovered another morocco...an altogether different and separate morocco...outside of the medina walls. the modern morocco of posh cafes, people dressed like the french drinking coffees that cost more than they do in london, minimalistic design and fancy shiny cars, namebrand clothing and women smoking, drinking, and kissing in public. this is the real morocco actually. the morocco they have made for themselves that is completely removed from the morocco inside the medina walls, independent of tourists. big discovery that has led to continued discussions and thoughts about the dynamics of life in morocco. before it was too simple....we were seeing exactly what we thought we would see...but now it gets more interesting...

in between we went to a small coastal town called essaouira. super small, super nice, with nothing to do...especially in the rain. but still we managed to spend a good 3 days happily doing nothing....including going to the nicest doctor ive ever been to in my life because i was a bit sick...

and now....im going south in search of warmer weather and the desert. from there the plan is to travel back up the coast to towns such as agadir, maybe stopping back in essaouira for a day or something, safi, a few smaller towns, maybe rabat, a few of the places i breezed through with the family (larache and assilah), and a mountain town called chefchaouen. and then take the ferry back to spain...do a few places in the south (cordoba and seville) and then up the coast of portugal.

i will try to post pictures in the next few days....i was going to today but time is quickly running out before i have to catch my bus....i never seem to have the time to get all the things done on a computer that works that i want or need to do.

i hope everyone is well and id love to hear from you!
jessie

its about time

2009-01-28T15:04:00.000-08:00

PICTURES FROM SPAIN!!!!!!!!!!!!!

i am in morocco. internet is limited...well not so much availability but time sitting down at one that works well...so sorry for the lack of communication. but enjoy the pictures and hope all is well! know that im safe and having the best time!!!!!!!!!!!

2009-01-11T08:45:00.000-08:00

i love spain.

so far...girona

barcelona

tarragona

valencia.

they are all amazing. the people are friendly, the weather is almost nice, the towns are cute, the streets are small.

barcelona is by far my favorite...maybe my favorite city ive ever been in. it has everything...big and small, beach and city, beautiful buildings and art, and restaurants and bars galore!

as far as small towns go i like girona best. maybe it is because it was my introduction to spain...but anyways it have a nice river running through the town with bright riverside houses, the sun was shining, and there is a city wall that you can walk on with an amazing view of the city and some gardens around.

im in valencia now and i also like it. the old city is small and cozy with tapas bars everywhere full of people having the most leisurely meal of their lives, even at midnight.

this is just to touch base. hope you´re all well...hopefully i can write more later!

when in rome...and sardinia...

2009-01-03T11:31:00.000-08:00

do as the romans and sardinians do: eat four course meals everyday starting with the best cheeses and salamis, followed by a pasta dish, followed by a meat course of lamb, pork, and/or goat, and ending with fruit and sweets. and all the while never having an empty glass of wine. and never stopping a loud and animated discussion about something or other (it doesn't matter what it is actually). ahh. its the life.

so...i left london...the pictures from the previous post are some final flashes of my life there. francesco came to italy a day before me. which means i had a day in london by myself. it was strange...i spent most of the day holed up in our apartment using the time to attempt to make him a christmas present that he wouldn't be witness to....and also i was on a tight budget of 70 pence so i wouldn't have to withdraw any money on my last day. it worked.

rome was....well....amazing. overall i think i prefer florence as far as cities in italy, but rome was a whole different place. it is much bigger, much more city-feeling, and much more powerful (which i think is why i like quaint florence). everywhere you turn there are important people, or more accurately, people who think they are important. of course i didn't recognize anyone, but francesco was forever pointing out old presidents or political figures, we saw the ex-communist leader going into the parliament, AND we saw tinto brass, a famous italian director who convinced the world that his movies were artfully erotic, not porn. apparently he's a butt man.

not only were there important people everywhere...but roman ruins everytime you lifted your eyes. we went to all the classic places...the colosseum in all its glory....we heard stories about the naval battles they had there and the gladiator fights. it reminded me of when i was at the roman bath in bath and the guide was telling us about how all the sweat and hair and dirt and grime that the gladiators excreted in the hot rooms were saved and botttled and sold to the rich ladies of the city so that they could apply it to their faces and hope to absorb the gladiators beauty and strength and virtility. yeah....i was disgusted. who really knows if it was really gladiator gunk....and even if it was....who really wants to put it on their face?! but anyways...gladiators....colosseum.

we also went to the foro beside the colosseum, the main square of the city. there were temples and columns and marble everywhere. picture perfect ruins. i couldnt believe the amount of old stones. everywhere you looked old stones. the columns are my favorite.

and then...what is rome without the vatican? we couldnt stay away. somehow we ended up inside the vatican city almost everyday....once just to see...the second time for the vatican museum so that we could be disgusted by the popes wealth and at the same time admire his collection of amazing artwork. i really liked the hall of maps in the museum...maps painted on the wall from the 14th century of all the popes land from the view of the vatican city....and after the endless halls of extravagance (including an absolutely disgusting display of "modern art" they force you to walk through) we finally made it to the sistene chapel and admired michelangelo at his finest. truth be told, i wasnt super impressed right at first...but gradually my mind was changed. more than the panels themselves i liked the characters between the panels which are painted in 2D but look like statues popping out of the ceiling.

....and we even went back to the grand ol vatican to see il papa (the pope) himself give his sunday blessing from his window looking down on the square (this is something important italians like to do....look down on their audience....its a show of power....not like important americans who just speak from a stage to give the illusion of being equal to their audience. the end result is the same though. some sociological insight for you). sorry to say all we saw of il papa was his backside as he was walking away because we were a bit too late....somehow we werent sad though. our morning espresso was much more important than il papa. we did donate money to his ever growing riches because we purchased a vatican paper out of curiousity. we even got an idol of the virgin mary and baby jesus AND a picture of the pope free with the paper. lucky us.

and now....SARDINIA. which isnt italy and italy isnt sardinia. just for the record. and i am part sardinian. i believe by now im something like: half sardinian, half indian, half american indian, half polish, and possibly some small part american.

some instructions for sardinian survival:

1. when playing in the countryside dont expect to interact with any sheep, even though there are more sheep than humans on this island. you may, however, find a dog that looks and smells incredibly like a sheep. he makes a good second choice. much more interactive.

2. when riding a train from cagliari to sassari, it is common to wait for several minutes at each station, not for people to get on and off the train, but for a train coming the other direction to pass as there is only one track any route on the whole island thus one train at a time. apparently you shouldnt be alarmed either if your carriage fills with a thick black smelly smoke. it just means something broke. and you should just open the windows for the smell to go away and continue on the journey as planned.

3. a city on this island may have all appearances of providing public transportation...but looks can be deceiving. in sassari what appears to be a tram is really only the structure of a tram. it may move on a tram line BUT there is only one line in the city with no set schedule thus said tram serves no purpose whatsoever. the same could be said for buses in cagliari. despite having bus stops with lists of bus routes, on certain days without any notification, there could be only two buses for the whole city, leaving every 1.5 hours and going anywhere they want.

4. if you have an insider with you who can translate sardinian songs, dont be surprised by lyrics such as "oh my god! there is a black guy on the roof!" (francesco and i have decided to make an american version for the new era: oh my god! obamas on the roof!)

5. sometimes the stereotype of an italian grandmother is almost true. the supreme matriarch, pillar of the family, whose goal is to feed everyone until they explode and who displays life-sized jesus statues in every room of her house (along with crosses, portraits of il papa, glow-in-the-dark st. francesco figures, and of course a few virgin marys). it is strongly advised to hide all said artifacts in chosen bedroom as to prevent nightmares.

6. a few useful sardinian words: ajo (said ayo, meaning lets go), eja (said eya, meaning yes) and I!!!!! (said like e, meaning extreme enthusiasm and/or disbelief)

i have much more insight for you all...but im sorry to say that for now this will have to do. just for the record though, i have won the hearts of the village of tula, proved by fact that i got a christmas present from nona! there are pictures posted here, including the ones from the beginning of this post and more from rome, and some from sardinia....but not all from sardinia.

i am headed to spain tonight. i am not sure when i will be updating this next or what my plans are. ill figure it all out when i get there i suppose. hope youre all well and feel free to drop me an email anytime! i have a new email address: jessieleighhodges@gmail.com or the old one: jlh_bird@yahoo.com.

ciao!!!

just quickly

2008-12-30T11:15:00.000-08:00

here are a few last pictures of london/bath

i will write more in a bit about the roman baths...if you're interested....i loved it actually and i'm glad i went because there were any as well preserved in rome!

ENJOY here

jessie :)

things are looking from up to up

2008-12-10T07:06:00.000-08:00

my parents came and went.....:(

their visit was...interesting. haha.

1. dad destroyed his sciatic nerve on the trip over.

2. both of their bags were lost for two days.

3. there was only one full day of clear skies.

BUT despite that it was really good having them here. dad got a cane and went to the free hospital and wobbled around london some. it was nice just having them see my daily life and what i've been doing the past few months away from home...which is nothing much....:) but they got to see WHERE i was doing nothing. and of course...we got to eat at all my favorite restaurants.

highlights of their trip include but are not limited to: taking a boat ride to greenwich to straddle the prime meridian (but we forgot to set our clocks to official time. whoops), seeing the london eye at all times of the day including at night with orange clouds, going to leeds castle in kent decorated for christmas with a theme of the nutcracker...which meant completely over-the-top ballerina/rat/candy/fairytale stuff everywhere, the maze at leeds castle which mom and i got lost in and had to follow a child to get out of, the dog collar museum at leeds castle...the biggest one in the world!...and maybe the only one...and yes i said dog collar, notting hill market and the colored houses, spitalfields market in the freezing cold, v&a museum, british museum, thanksgiving dinner of chinese duck rather than turkey (the logic being it was still a BIRD so it counts somewhat), winter wonderland in hyde park with all the cheesy christmas-themed rides including a haunted house with santa!, getting christmas stockings once the luggage came, having a pint at one of the oldest pubs in london, and of course posing constantly with the telephone booths and double-decker buses.

see some (but not all) of the pictures here.

other than that life here is going along. and finally we are staring to have some ideas about what is ahead.

december 18th we leave for rome for four days.

december 22nd we go to sardinia for christmas in sassari/tula (the village where francesco's dad's family is from). we also have a big party on the 27th in another village close to there....the whole village opens their homes and has free food and free homemade wine...just a big night of eating and drinking.

and then...

francesco just found out he was accepted for an internship at amnesty international for four months starting in january. while he comes back to london to do that....i will TRAVEL.

jan 6th i have a ticket to barcelona from sardinia.

jan 8th i have a ticket to madrid from sardinia.

hehe. i bought two different tickets because they were really cheap (as in less than $10). so i will use just one of them...and travel down the respective coast of spain....the east mediterranean coast from barcelona or the west and into portugal from madrid. i will make my way all the way down and into....MOROCCO!!!! taking a ferry from the southern part of spain. i think i will stay in morocco for a month or so...depending on how i like it. i am really interested to see what its like....but i think i will enjoy being there. afterwards i'll travel back the other side of spain and from there....who knows. one idea is to take local buses from spain into the rest of europe....maybe the through the south of france. i think it would be a fun way to travel, cheap and scenic...and since i have all the time i need the slowness won't be an issue.

another idea is to head back to india. i found cheap cheap tickets...i am really missing being there and francesco as well wants to go back. if i exhaust too much money or desire to be in europe i can always make my way back to my other homeland and find some things to do there. there is always traveling around india. i still haven't been to the south and there are still a million trillion places i want to see and lots of things i want to learn about india. but also there is plenty of opportunities working and/or volunteering with NGOs...whether it be the one i've worked for before or a new one.

so those are the plans so far. as you can see they are still loose and flexible...but its nice to know at least a general idea of whats possible and not possible. london was/is getting a bit stressful as both francesco and i are a bit suspended in a state between holidays and working, without really doing either one. and its bloody EXPENSIVE!!!

everyone keep me updated on things....and i do have an address and phone number if anyone is interested. well the address will soon be obsolete but if its something interesting i can always give you the address i'll be at in italy...say for CHRISTMAS PRESENTS or something...hehe. just kidding!

AND before all this international travel even starts i'm taking a mini-trip within england. to BATH! just a day trip on friday....and just to see the roman baths....which is a bit silly since i'm going to rome in like a week and a half. oh well :)

AND here are a few more pictures.

i'm so edgy

2008-11-23T16:13:00.000-08:00

FIRST AND FOREMOST:

my parents are coming on tuesday!!!!!!!!!

(tomorrow i'm using it as an excuse to go to a yoga class...to prepare for their visit...but really i just want to try yoga and feel like i need some justification for being "that" girl who lives in india for 8 months and doesn't try yoga until she is in london...what the heck?!)

secondly....

this photo album is mostly for my brother....but the rest of you can enjoy as well...its a collection of some of the graffiti and street art images i've taken from manhattan (lower east side, soho, west village) and london (mostly south embankment). there are a few repeats from my first post on here....and a few random images thrown in there as well.

NEXT TO COME:

a second installment of london photographs, including pictures from my parents visit!!!!

tartan, kilts, bagpipes, and hairy cows.

2008-11-19T14:28:00.000-08:00

cottage in the countryside

calling the cows.....

such a country girl

an old castle in st. andrews

view of edinburgh from the castle on the hill

alright. so truth be told i only saw a few of those things in passing...not even a bagpipe up close but i heard the music from afar...and i didn't even get a glimpse of a hairy cow but i saw plenty of regular cows (including aberdeen cows...which make the best meat :) ) and plenty of sheep. I LOVE SCOTLAND!!!!

francesco and i went for just three short days to stay with his aunt and uncle in balmullo, a small village near st. andrews, where golf was invented and all the rules to golf are still made every year. and when i say small village i mean SMALL village, as in only one store with a post office attached...and one hair dresser...and thats it. but it was really nice. they travel a lot so they are full of stories about places all over the world. and we were lucky with the weather, two days of pure sunshine (even if it was completely cold) and the last day we spend roaming around edinburgh in the rain....oh well. the first day we saw the sights of st. andrews. and the second day we went on a long wandering stroll through the countryside. we did a big loop up a hill, around some fields, past some cows, saw the view above the village of the sea and the surrounding villages, and then through some woods on our way back to town. the countryside is full of the stereotypical cottages with slate roofing, ivy growing up the walls, fences that are falling down, and overgrown gardens full of flowers and herbs. its perfect. i really fell in love with the scottish countryside. and the people are such a nice change from english people....they are friendly and warm and welcoming....whereas the english are a bit standoffish and rude.

on monday we took the train to edinburgh where we explored the edinburgh castle and some of the town. it was raining, as i said, and really freezing cold, so our biggest mission was finding a local coffee shop that is open late and warm. it turned out to be a harder mission than we thought. for a while we could only find starbucks...we finally found a local one, ordered our drinks, and then realized they were closing in 15 mins. bad luck. but they recommended a place right down the block, a laid back self-serve salad/vegetarian restaurant that turned out to be incredible. we got a cheese platter and sat for 3 hours listening to an old man play amazing piano.

we have plenty of stories from the bus ride there and back as well....10 hours overnight each way. on the way up we were seated right next to two extremely drunk english girls who were determined to stay up all night and make everyone else do the same. eventually we found seats at the back of the bus....only to be woken up by the driver stopping the bus and running down the road, only to come back with two pieces of luggage....apparently we lost them somewhere along the way. whoops. on the way home we had a nazi for a bus driver who insisted on lecturing us over the intercom about bus etiquette. ahh life is hard isn't it?!

you can see these pictures and more here....ENJOY!

LONDon and off

2008-11-01T12:20:00.000-07:00

so. life in london.

we live in camberwell....in the southeast of london. our flat is quite nice...we have it mostly to ourselves although we do have two flatmates, a gay spanish chemistry teacher and a polish construction worker. we never see them. they stay locked in their rooms...or at work...something which neither of us can relate to at the moment. our neighborhood is nice....full of africans and caribbeans and just a short bus ride away from the city center. we are trying to figure out the complicated culture of black hair salons.....there is about three on every block in our neighborhood. most of them don't open until the afternoon and dont' get busy until later in the evening when their couches (yes couches) are jam packed with people watching other people get there hair done. we've even seen a few with in-house djs. i think francesco will go soon to have his hair cut...and maybe i'll get mine braided......what do you think?

we've just been relaxing and enjoying london. discovering old places and new places, roaming aimlessly around the city, each day a new neighborhood.....or one we've been to already and know we like. if we run into a street market, we'll stop. if we find a cute coffeeshop or tea house, we try it out. we have a few places that have become part of our regular week or day....but usual any day we're up for anything.....although lately the weather has turned a bit cold and francesco has dedicated himself to studying for the GRE...so its been more time in our flat and not quite so much time on adventures.

we did take a mini-trip a few days ago (although we didnt' intend for it to be really). we wanted to celebrate diwali, a big indian festival. we had heard that maybe there would be something going on in the suburb of southall which is about 130% indian or pakistani so we decided to see what we could find. we took a bus - 50 mins - and then a train - 20 mins - to the suburb, stepped out of the station and were immediately disappointed. we were hoping for a little piece of india...but instead we found english-india...which means...depressing india. none of the loud music and bright colors and people pushing and shoving. BUT we did find a gurdwara (my favorite temples in india and the largest one outside of india)....and a massive hail/snow storm. we took shelter in a restaurant, gave it a rating based on its chai (about a 7.5) and enjoyed a 3 hour long bollywood movie.

the end. here is a link to more pictures....random scenes of london. but not really any of the familiar tourist monuments...i'm saving them for when my parents come!

ciao and ciao - hello and goodbye

2008-10-26T08:03:00.000-07:00

so...we've been back to london from italy for about a week and a half. in the meantime we've finally gotten internet in our apartment....BUT my computer's hard drive CRAAASHED and burned...right after i saved a long, detailed description of the rest of our trip to italy to post on here for you all. so instead i have posted pictures on facebook and will put the public link here. i tried to describe the trip along with the pictures so you could follow along with visuals.

so...in summary....i am computerless but italy was absolutely amazing.

see for yourself here

ENJOY.

2008-10-15T04:01:00.000-07:00

more pictures

ITALY (bit by bit)

2008-10-15T02:01:00.000-07:00

sooooo.

i got to london. after being endlessly harassed by the immigration officers. i think they are just jealous...they have to stare at people's passports all day but never get a chance to leave their desks. i dont' blame them really...but i mean....what harm can i do to england? sweet little innocent me?

anyways i had two fast fast days in london (but time enough to find a favorite coffee shop close to our apartment, did you doubt it?) and then off to italy. the plan was to make it to florence for one of francesco's friend's graduation parties (except it was cancelled). so we just had a 10 day vacation....and met some of his friends and family along the way.

first stop - day one: PISA. (and yes of course i saw the leaning tower of pisa...and took cheesy tourist pictures with it)

we just walked around all day stopping along the way for wine and cheese. we saw the tower. and laughed at the japanese taking pictures. francesco started his 10 day long lecture about art history and architecture. we found a little secret square (that probably isn't secret but it felt like we were discovering something) in the middle of the city and had a super-duper pisan lunch (and i tried my first espresso.....maybe it was a mistake. i'm addicted)

thats it really. at night we roamed around the main street with all the people shopping. francesco had a scare because he "lost" his identification card (which is a bit like his passport so he would have been stuck....) but i saved the day. it was a good introduction to italy...and really the only day we had all to ourselves to celebrate our reunion.

next stop - day two : BOLOGNA (where we visited francesco's brother)

bologna is a nice city....full of arches over the sidewalks and college students. we met up with nicholas (francesco's younger brother) at his apartment and also one of francesco's best friends from high school. had lunch of pasta with dried, crush fish eggs powder...apparently a sardinian (where francesco is from) specialty? i dont' know. we walked around the main city. bologna has a leaning tower too that no one knows about....but really its just a tower that is starting to sink into the clay. and its not very pretty. we decided it was a signpost for the gelato shop that is right next to it so from all around the city you can know how to get the best ice cream ever.

and for our daily dose of exercise we walked up one trillion million stairs (and 666 arches built in the 18th century) up and around a mountain to get to a church (madonna di san luca) at the top that overlooks the countryside and the city a bit. passed rich bolognian villas on the way and all the sacraments of jesus (and a priest explaining them to a mass of boy scouts and their families).

for dinner we indulged in a very amazing italian idea called aperitivo (i think) where restaurants put out various appetizers and you can eat as much as you want as long as you get one drink. so one glass of wine and endless food. not bad. the one we went to in bologna wasn't the best...but we tried at least a few in every city.

and for now that will have to be all. i'm sufficiently frustrated with this blog and its inability to post pictures at the moment. so a few pictures from bologna will come later as well as the rest of our trip....and i think i will also post pictures on facebook and give you guys the public link to see these and more.

i'll figure it out eventually.

2008-09-30T23:18:00.000-07:00

so these are some of the many pictures. i will figure out a better format eventually i assume...because i think this is a bit of a mess. i'm new to this whole blogging business. i never thought i would be a blogger...but its the best way i knew to actually keep you all informed about my adventures. so excuse the profanity (although i think that particular statement expresses my sentiments exactly)

new york city. but mostly brooklyn. where all the cool kids are.

2008-09-30T22:52:00.001-07:00

so i have started my new journey....with three days in new york with my best friend maria who moved up here for grad school. every time i come back to the city i remember how much i love it. i love that there is always something to do and something to discover.

this is a very brief and condensed version of our escapades. brief as in short snippets that do nothing really but increase your curiosity. enjoy!

saturday night: restaurant in park slope. made friends with our waiter. who turned out to be super cool. and gave us inside info of what to do on...

....sunday: renaissance festival at the cloisters. in all its sword-fighting, knight-in-chain-mail-jousting, olde english glory. and giant pickles. and turkey legs. amazing. and sunday night we saw an excellent show (great lake swimmers) in a bar that really wants to be an old man's library.

monday: maria had to work and do the school thing all day, so i walked around 83% aimlessly and took pictures of the street art and graffiti in the lower east side and soho mostly. i love the details of the city.

tuesday: walked around park slope (where maria lives). shopped a little bit. tried to go to MOMA but it was closed (not for rosh hashanah though, its closed every tueday). and met up with said waiter for a improv comedy show at the upright citizens brigade. it was hilarious.

so here are just a few pictures of new york. my monday street art series mostly.