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These are just some thoughts and reflections on life, spirituality and culture from our first six weeks living in Hyderabad, India. Mostly they are questions and wonderings based on our day-to-day experiences. More to come later.
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August 5, 2011
After a long overnight wait at LAX and a wunderbar layover in Frankfurt (and a fish sauce-related fiasco), Diana and I have arrived in Hyderabad, India, and are ready to start our lives here together. It may sound unusual, disastrous even, to choose to spend our first 6 months of marriage living out of a suitcase and traveling the world, but it's what seemed best for us and I am confident we will learn a lot about marriage and life together while we are here.
Diana's friend Babu picked us up from the airport late at night and graciously gave us his studio apartment to stay in for the night. 'Studio apartment' doesn't quite fit the bill - it was more like a room attached to someone else's house. Needless to say it was a quick and dirty welcome to life in India. i remember when i was here a year ago in much more comfortable means. There was little to complain about because I did not have to confront anything disheartening. This time around, right after disembarking, bugs, floor, and buckets.
We made it through the night and the next morning met the landlady, who was, as I recall, elegantly wrapped Brahmin-style in her sari - a "paka indian woman," Babu exalted. Her demeanor paralleled her regal look. A namaskaram with one hand and a graceful head bobble reassured me that there is indeed beauty here waiting to greet me.
* * *
Babu showed us to our flat in Kalyan Nagar, or Vengal Rao Nagar, or Ameerpet. Without addresses, we are still not exactly sure where it is. It is a simple 2-bedroom apartment featuring both a western toilet and a squatty potty - our first home together! It's sparsely put together with mediocre craftsmanship, and every window and terrace is caged, but it's now home. After a while, the cage is just a part of the view.
After settling in Babu zipped me around on his motorbike picking up supplies for our flat. One errand involved a precarious journey where I held a portable gas stove and two tanks full of natural gas (Indian Natural Gas, as Babu reminded me several times) while he threaded us through the insane traffic. Insane actually doesn't quite do it justice. Fortunately, we didn't explode in flames and now we can cook!
With a bed, a fridge, an Indian natural gas stove, 2 plastic lounge chairs, a suitcase-turned-coffee table, and internet on the way, we are ready for newlywed domesticity!
* * *
The Drunken Watchmen:
Telugu is a really flowy language; it's hard to tell when one word ends and another begins. Even diana, who has had 4 months of lessons, finds it hard to hear the crucial word endings. Some scholars have said it has the most syllables per minute of any language! We both realized that it is especially difficult to understand when the speaker is drunk (and even harder when you know but five words).
Aporo is our watchman. (I'll have to admit, it's kind of nice having someone get your drinking water, take your trash out and handle your bills. We haven't gone to the extreme of having him wash and iron our clothes though). He came knocking at about 9pm on our first night and made all sorts of gestures trying to communicate with me -- his two hands alternating up-and-down. Do i want coffee? Do i want tea? Am i washing dishes? Doing my laundry? Do I juggle? I couldn't really piece together what he was saying, that is, until he rubbed his thumb, index and middle fingers together in the universal dolla-dolla-bills-y'all gesture.
He wanted money.
I was a bit taken aback by this direct supposition. Who would ask for money right after meeting someone, especially someone you are going to see everyday for the net five months? I gave him 130 rupees (about $3) because I sort of understood that he wanted us to tip him for helping move our suitcases into the apartment earlier that day. But then I got confused by other gestures - did he want money for cleaning our floor (which was not clean, by the way), or did he want money because he showed me where to wash and dry our clothes? After i gave him the 130 rupees, he wanted more! I said no, and he dragged me down to find a neighbor who could translate.
Downstairs, I asked the neighbor what Aporo wanted, and why he wanted it. When he explained to her, she shook her head and said 'chalu!' - enough! (six words now! and a useful one, at that). She told me he wanted a tip for all the help he gave, but added that he was drunk and that I should not mind the demands of a drunk man. With that, Aporo beckoned me back into the elevator and showed me back up to our apartment.
As it turns out, part of the gesturing was that he wanted to know if we wanted milk in the morning. Cow udders!
* * *
Hello, Poverty
After a month of honeymooning in Europe, and being in reclusive domesticity in Oakland and Long Beach, it's been quite a re-introduction to the face of poverty. While we live in a rather quiet area of hyderabad, the poor are everywhere. Some are just downstairs, sleeping on a grass mat in the parking lot, making sure I'm safe and have enough water to drink...
August 6, 2011
I was overwhelmed at Big Bazaar last night.
i made the same observation last year and i'm going to say it again: There are HELLA people in India. Everywhere. There are people everywhere. Even in the Big Bazaar, a Super-Walmart type place, there were people in every aisle, every row, looking at every product that was for sale. Where do all these people come from?! Just imagine, over a billion people in a place just a third the size of the US! Three times as many people in one-third the space!
August 9, 2011
It's only been six days but I feel much much better about being here. I am starting to like it -- the different environs, learning a new culture, figuring out this puzzle (to the outsider) that is India.
* * *
i almost cried at church last sunday. during the second worship song, which was led by zealous worship leaders who didn't care they were off beat, I began to feel that overwhelming feeling. It was gratitude - for all that God has blessed me with, and for all the joy that I could see in the worshippers' faces. Even though they were here, a small group of believers in a primarily Hindu and Muslim world, they loved God and were devoted to him. That's what I love about the church outside of the US. It feels, more so than it does stateside, like a real haven -- a beacon of light and hope in a time and place where idols are real and in-your-face. The need for God is palpable.
I held back the tears, as I always do, but perhaps by the end of this sabbatical I will be able to let them run free. It is nice to know that I am moved still by the grace of God, and I hope that what I experienced this past Sunday was but the welling and not the catharsis.
August 10-17: Goa and Kerala
We loved going to Kerala with our friends Greg and Wendy from Oakland. The houseboat cruise through the backwaters in Alleppey was absolutely stunning, but I did have some mixed feelings about what it actually was. It felt, to be honest, like the Jungle Cruise in Disneyland. There we were, on a giant houseboat all to our selves, three Indian staff and 4 Americans waiting to be waited on.
While the backwaters are an exquisite natural phenomenon, getting to see "real Keralan life" (as the pamphlets and brochures suggest) was a little awkward. As the boat cruised along, we watched people bathe themselves in the river, fish for food, wash their dishes, coddle their kids, adjust their lungis, talk to their neighbors, and commence all sorts of daily life activities. I guess it was normal, except for the fact that every few minutes, boats of tourists would cruise by and gawk and wave and stare and snap snazzy digital photos, deleting the ones that are perhaps too real.
It was life on display, and though I know this is the bread and butter of the tourist industry, something about this blatant voyeurism felt uncomfortable and overly intrusive. I just hope that the smiles and warm gestures we tried to give were enough to communicate our appreciation and gratitude for them sharing their beautiful slice of earth with us.
August 21, 2011
i've been learning a lot about simplicity, and I am glad that diana and I are starting off our married lives together on this note. We make do with the little we have (household goods), and are eating pretty simply. We find joy in the simple pleasures - reading books, cooking, cleaning, praying, taking basic care of ourselves. It really is liberating and freeing, and so completely different from our lives back in California. It's funny because while I thought we lived pretty simply then, we actually didn't. We frequented cafes and Yelp-endorsed Oakland/SF eats. We ate good, quality food, and spent our time working hard and playing hard. There was little time for God, and taking care of ourselves had to be scheduled in. I thrived in that life, being the workaholic that I am, but i am beginning to think that I thrived because I had to and knew no alternative...
* * *
Jesus is revered here. I think that in a land filled with other gods, the words "Name above all names" actually means something. When you can see the spirited attempts to worship and pray to other gods, your worship of the One True God means so much more. I wish that we approached Jesus with the same certainty and reverence back in the US. Here, they endure, no, RELISH, the two-and-half-hour church service, while we would start checking our phones the minute it goes over 1 hour. In the US, our god is time, and we grovel to it; even God is limited when we don't have the time for Him...
* * *
We had dreams of becoming vegetarians during out time in India, but it's just too painful. Today is Sunday so we had chicken at Bowl'O'China. Oh, chicken I love you.
August 23, 2011
In many ways, simplicity is a luxury. Being simple takes time. I don't have time in the US, so it's hard to be simple. Ponder that.
* * *
Outsourced
I work as an online algebra teacher coach for a US company - a US job paying in US dollars. It's convenient because I just work for a few hours a day in the mornings here and it's enough to cover our expenses. I troubleshoot with teachers and coach them on developing lesson plans and curriculum for their math courses. It's a sweet gig.
It's strange to walk around Hyderabad and see all the ads for outsourced work. It reminds me just how small our world really is. Though I'm not technically outsourced, the online work I'm doing makes me wonder about the thousands of call center workers around me in Hyderabad and Bangalore, who also deal with US issues but get paid in Indian Rupees. I've heard all kinds of complaints and stories about call center works getting berated on the phone. Americans are not nice when it comes to getting what they want. Fortunately, the teachers I work with don't know I'm in India; my perfect American English disguises me.
Most of you have probably experienced a customer service call with someone who is clearly in India. The call is transferred and with that first "Guud Ahf-tah-noon, Sah" you're even more irate about the service than you were before the call -- I'm guilty myself. But really, do we need to be so upset that someone on the other side of the world is trying to help you with your problem? Shouldn't we be appreciative of such kindness spanning the globe?
What I've often had to remind myself while I've been here is that my English is not the correct English. We may think this indian English is broken English, but really, it's just Indian English and they have been speaking it for hundreds of years. It's beautiful and melodic, full of vim and character. These workers are doing their job and they shouldn't need to be berated for their accents.
* * *
Our Culture of Distrust
When people from the west travel, there's so much distrust. I've found India to be full of honest people who have a lot of integrity. They just want to welcome us, and make us feel at home, and show off the country they are so proud of. Often times I think that we travel to places and think they are seedy or full of scammers and pickpockets because we bring with us our own culture of distrust. We are fearful and anxious about safety and security not because they make it so. No, we make it so.
September 1, 2011
When I think about my life in the US, the word that comes to mind is chaotic. That's ironic because here in India, just walking down the street is a near-death experience, with auto rickshaws, tiny Tata cars, motorcycles, and large buses zooming within inches of your frame. Gaudily painted cargo trucks seem to accelerate at us when we try to cross the street, and if there is a gap between vehicles, fill it.
Diana and I have talked about returning to the US early, and my first feeling is one of panic, because I have made myself a life of chaos and frenzy in the US, much of it due to the culture in which we live. We are slaves to our work, and slaves to the money that we need to make in order to feed ourselves, entertain ourselves (or escape from the selves we've made?), and secure for ourselves a comfortable future life. In the hustle and bustle of the day, even the profound beauty and meaning of the most basic tasks get lost in the humdrum of life moving forward. What basic needs are there than to eat, clothe yourself, wash, and be with people? Why do the sacredness of those rituals get lost so easily in our full full full full days?
I am relishing this gift of simple living. For so long in the US, I thought simple living was refraining from material luxuries and comforts - not consuming too much and not wasting too much. Now I see a simpler side of simple living, one that is focused more on enjoying what is basic and essential in life - finding contentment in the act of living, and not living for contentment.
September 4, 2011
Mostly Questions…
Our friend lives in Naandi Nagar, aka "Banjara Hills Weaker Section". I noticed the painted verbiage as our autowallah pulled into the bus stop. There it was, announcing to all arrivers, both visitors and dwellers, that you were now in a "weaker section" of the city.
Of course, in my hotly egalitarian American mindset, this sort of labeling made me upset. How can you just call people weaker like that? Isn't it completely discriminatory and degrading?
On top of this, I have been looking in to volunteering with some relief organizations and many of them describe the work they do with the "backwards villages" and the "backwards people" inside those villages. Backwards does not seem like a nice term.
Aaravind Adiga, in his novel The White Tiger (fantastic read, by the way), describes rural villages as 'the Darkness' and rural-urban migrants as 'from the Darkness." Is this really what the perception is? Why are people so accepting of the weaker-darness-backwardsness in their country?
September 5, 2011
Question of the season: Why was my life in the U.S. so chaotic?!?!
September 7, 2011
I have been thinking more about this weaker-darkness-backwardness (see Sept 4). Aporo, our oft-drunk watchmen (see our first day, Aug 5), again asked us for money as we were heading out for the day. The reek of his whiskey breath clarified his intentions for me and we just kept going. But what bothers me, and has bothered me, is the complete shamelessness with which this begging happens. He is going to see us everyday for the next 4 months, and he works for our landlord. Is it not totally inappropriate to ask us repeatedly for money? Apparently not. Apparently this is what is expected...
I think this may be the consequence of the weaker-darkness-backwardness. If people are labeled something and told repeatedly what they are, they become it. They stand by it. They operate how they are expected to operate. Aporo is not weak or dark or backwards because he is weak or dark or backwards - he is those things because his people told him he was those things, and he sadly has not questioned it.
When I became a teacher it was motivated by this same injustice, played out in black and white in the US. At a World Impact Oakland community barbecue I was playing with some young African-American children when one of them ran into a picket fence, staining his arm with a swath of white paint. He asked me to help him clean it off in the laundry room. As I searched for some soap and started to help him rinse, he said, "Help me get this off, even though I want to be white."
"What?"
"I want to be white."
"Why do you say that?"
"Because black people are dumb."
He ran off at that point, ready to go back to playing. I watched the white pigment swirl down the drain, wanting to un-hear what I just heard.
It was the same incomprehension with Aporo. As I wrote before, I just could not understand why or how he could ask us for money so unashamedly. As I have seen and learn and come to understand so much about this broken world of ours, I see that the things that do not make sense to us are often the things in us that do not make sense. We do this kind of demeaning and debasing each day - in our words and actions, and yes, I'll say it, in our votes and consumption and politics. When we see the seeming irrationality of the illogical around us, we wonder HOW!? WHY? forgetting that it was us all along.
We intend to give Aporo a big tip in the end when we leave, but in the meantime, I want to treat him as he doesn't expect to be treated…ideas?
September 13, 2011
So many things to write about on our trip through more rural Andhra Pradesh. Leaving Hyderabad on Friday night, we went to the Nampally Train Station to catch the Narsapur Express to Narsapur, a small town near the Godavari River delta. Babu, diana's telugu tutor-turned-friend had arranged a 4 night/3day trip to his hometown, and brought along his good friend and fellow aspiring telugu film actor Naveen.
From the moment we got to the train station, I knew we were in for an adventure. Babu, who kept insisting that our reservations were confirmed, failed to tell us that we were in fact waitlisted for seats, at WL#23-26 for that matter!
Diana: "So…we're not confirmed"
Babu: "Yes, tickets are confirmed"
Diana: "But we don't have seats"
Babu: "No seats, train is full"
Diana: "So our seats are not confirmed"
Babu: "Yes, confirmed"
Actually, to get the maximum effect read the conversation as such:
Diana: "So…we're not confirmed" [bobble bobble]
Babu: "Yes, tickets are confirmed" [bobble bobble]
Diana: "But we don't have seats" [wobble wobble]
Babu: "No seats, train is full" [bobble bobble]
Diana: "So our seats are not confirmed" [wobble wobble]
Babu: "Yes, confirmed" [bobble bobble bobble bobble]
Babu and Naveen made us sit down while they ran around the station trying to find a Ticket Collector (TC) who could help us get seats. At one point about 20 minutes before the train was set to leave, we all just found an empty berth and sat in it. They said we were fine. That is, until the TC came aboard and yelled at us to get off.
Then things got desperate. With about 7 minutes left to departure, Babu pleaded with the TC on the platform. No!
Then he made me plead with the TC. No!
Then Babu went up to him again. After some more intense bobbling (I get confused because intense bobbling seems to start during both times of excitement and anger, so i couldn't tell what the TC was communicating), the TC relented and Babu told us to get on the train.
We sat in the same empty berth as before and Babu told us that the TC let us onboard because he had conjured up a sob-story about how we were two Americans visiting India and were building an orphanage in his hometown. Look, we're so kindhearted! Babu convinced him because we absolutely had to get on the train to go to the opening of the orphanage (My apologies for adding to the bad rep of overseas orphanages, because we are in fact not building an orphanage). Babu is an actor at heart (he loves sentimental Telugu films), and the TC was evidently moved by such heroics.
As Babu recounted the story to us, we hear a beckoning call from the next berth: "Babu!" It was the TC. Whoops! Hope he doesn't understand English! Babu darted over and we tried to put our best American-savior faces on lest the TC come and have a second look at our questionably-natured selves.
When babu returned he had a sour look on his face, and made a gesture all too familiar to us in India - thumb, index and middle fingers rubbing a greasy wheel - the TC wanted Rs.2000 for his efforts (that's a little over $40). but "shhh!" babu told us, the TC didn't want the foreigners to know.
Now I've had to bribe my fair share of public officials (Tijuana, Accra, Phnom Penh, Oakland? to name a few), but I love the added twist of "Don't tell the foreigners!" What, did he think Babu would just have an extra 2000 rupees laying around? That's about 10% of his monthly income!
We paid up. The 2000 Rupees bought us the right to sit on the porter's bed by the toilet, outside the A/C cabin. Diana and I were prepared for a night of olfactory onslaught but in the end the TC did do us a favor and I don't feel cheated. After all, we were NOT confirmed on this train in the first place. It is strange though that after an hour of squatting by the potty, our 2000 rupees managed to find us 4 perfectly comfortable sleeping births in the A/C cabin.
* * *
We arrived in the early morning and Babu was so excited to show us what essentially was (no hard feelings here) a big dirty river. Diana and I tried to smile and repeatedly say, "It's beautiful" but after the seventh bridge (I still don't quite get how we crossed the same river seven times in trying to get to Rajahmundry), we could only offer weak smiles. "It's like a God," Babu said, of the Godavari River. d=Diana quipped, "Then why are people throwing trash in it?" My wife is great like that.
The trip was great though, a break from our…break? We had ample delicious Indian street food and saw some fascinating Ganesh-immersions for the Vinayaka Chaturthi festival. I used my fingers like the locals do to devour the most delicious biryani I have had in my life (in a very very dark restaurant), and we met some wonderfully friendly and welcoming people while working in their fields.
In many ways, the tour was a Chiranjeevi pilgrimage. Chiranjeevi, as I discovered very early on in my time in Hyderabad, is the Telugu film industry's most respected actor and Babu's idol-other-than-Ganesh. He has moves BETTER than Mick Jagger. Seriously, go to youtube and look him up and you will find a sick, thick-mustached dancing fiend ("Indian Thriller" would be an exemplary and demonstrative clip). He is awesome but his pilgrimage meant little to those of us (Diana and I) outside his fandom:
Here is chiranjeevi's hometown. Here is chiranjeevi's village. Here is Chiranjeevi's relative's house. Here is a poster of Chiranjeevi. There is a billboard of Chiranjeevi's son. Chiranjeevi came to the dedication of this statue, and the crowd was so big that 14 people were trampled to death.
Chiranjeevi, like any other megastar, is not without controversy. In fact the most awkward moment of the trip was when Naveen and Babu got into a huge fight during said pilgrimage regarding the political achievements of their beloved Chiranjeevi, who is now an Andhra Pradesh congressman. Naveen argued that although he was a great film star, he was a terrible and greedy politician who only was looking out for his money. This made Babu irate [bobble bobble!] and they didn't talk for rest of the trip, using Diana and I, and to a greater extent the car driver, as a go-between in their Chiranjeevi tiff. The driver, Nani, whom they affectionally called cChiru (isn't Nani already affectionate enough?) was caught in their Chiranjeevi fallout and Diana and I didn't really know what to make of all the private conversations, glances and caresses they shared between them. (It is totally socially acceptable for men to hold hands as a sign of friendship here).
Fortunately, it seems that by the train ride back to Hyderabad, Babu and Naveen were friends again. They were flirting with a girl in their train car. And by flirting I mean stealing looks at her. From far away. Very far away.
* * *
The trip helped me to experience India in a way I had not before. I'm starting to understand Diana's feelings about Indian people more. This is her third trip here, and her 8th month living here in total. She uses the word "insistence" to describe what bothers her most about some of the Indian behavior she has experienced and it's true - the ones who have befriended her (perhaps due to their insistence) are rather demanding with their words.
Tt's exemplified in the phrase "come fast," which is what they say whenever we are supposed to meet them. Now, to the Indian ear it may not have any negative connotations, but to Diana and I it sounds very much like "Hurry the @#$% up!" I wonder, do we seem to them just slow plump Asians? Do my LBC roots give off a "Chill man, I'm in no rush vibe" that doesn't jive with India's "Be quick or we'll get hit by a bus / Be quick or the tiffin man will not give us our tiffins / Be quick or the theater will be filled" mentalities?
We often responded punctually to the demands of Come Fast, but often, we would come fast just to wait some more. And that, more than the demanding tone, is what bothered us most. We thought it was a language difference, explaining to Babu the tone of Come Fast was not really nice, but he said, "But I do mean for you to Come Fast!"
I guess we'll just have to deal with the differences and go with it, fast.
September 15, 2011
Should we come home early?
