lastest general letter from india
India
Ok so now this one’s from India and we are pulling out of the dock in20min so sad.
I LOVE India - like the ppl are amazing…. I went to a school fro disabled children and we did manual labor as well as playing with the kids - in my case it involved luggage books everywhere and categorizing them, others did garden work and painting murals. Playing with the kids and givin the stuff we brought to donate was the highlight of the trip and like this little girl came up to me and sat in my lap for no reason and wouldn’t let go of me - actually I have a girl on the ship who’s 7 who does the same exact thing too. Actually tonight I tried to take her to bed and she threw a fit bc she has to be with me for whatever reason… ok right now im actually about to puke bc the doxycycline (my anti-malarial) is not reacting well with my stomach and I like cant do anything anymore. And I refuse to buy a different one which is an option bc I have no money left to buy one with but anyways where was i?
Disabled children’s home - we got to chill the kids for hours and all the little girls there were fascinated with my braids and an interesting note: I got into several fights over whether or not im actually an Indian person or not - the braids finally persuaded that i am, in fact, American. But that’s was the beginning of the theme for the entire stay.
i participated in the nararatri celebrations which are a 9 day festival honoring female goddesses. 3 goddesses are honored and each one is given three days to be worshipped - unfortunately I do not remember which goddesses I think its durga, sarasvati, and laksmi but im probably wrong. Anyways for the celebrations a woman took us into her home, fed us, entertained us, let us take pictures of everything in her house, and then gave us gifts for having come. They even let us into their prayer room but only after giving the girls a brief detour (which scared us to death bc we thought we were in serious trouble) to tell us that if were on our period one is not allowed inside as place of worship bc its some sorta custom which they uphold…Um yeah they gave us like goodybags of stuff to take home with us including: coconuts, tumeric powder and leaves (for upset stomach/diarrhea and tumeric powder is a antiseptic as well), sandlewood powder (yay for sandlewood), bindis, mini statues, and a lil candylike thing.
I met these two lil girls on the street, latima and yasmin, and they were amazing. They were carrying a infant brother and their mother was nearby as well. The girls were begging us for food and money (it prolly didn’t help bc at the moment we had been standing in front of a bank waiting for some ppl to get rupees bc they didn’t do it while on the ship) and the mother was asking my friend ashley to go to the market and buy her a ring preferably a jeweled one - what happened to feeding her children? Why make the daughters care for the baby but whatever.
Anyways we went to the movies while here and saw this bollywood movie called bride and prejudice the movie was like an Indian spin on the reg one pride and prejudice and was hilarious… at one point they were in a U.S. Mexican bar with like stereotypical Mexican dress and behavior that was so wrong it was ridick but the best thing that got everyone was when they cut to a beach scene and on one side was a bunch of white ppl carrying surfboards and lifeguard equipment and on the other side was a HUGE black gospel choir singing but singing Indian music in blue robes on the beach… and it was like black on one side and white on the other - everyone had a ball with that scene. And the weirdest thing is that their movies have intermissions - at one point the screen went black and no one knew why and we were like uh and then finally the word INTERMISSION rolled across the screen and we were like ohhhhhhhhhhhhh ok. The whole movie experience, including food and beverage costs less than $3USD.
Even though we were told not to, and even thought if they get infected the hospital refuse to see us and our noses will fall off so many girls got piercings on this trip for the equivalent of $2USD. And cab or rather rickshaw rides across the city only cost a dollar or 45rupees. You have to bargain with them to get that price otherwise they ripping you off it gets to be quite fun… but the bad things is it gets you used to bargaining for like everything and not wearing a seatbelt. Ill also have to get used to seeing ppl wearing only normal clothing and like non-colored ppl which will be way weird.
In my psych class this guy who’s a complete asshole started talking about how Indian people are stupid for not having worked out a cheap sewage system and bc they have no place else to go the take craps on the street…. The guy like went on and on when the ppl have no money to o any of that stuff and when my teacher tried to intervene he told her she was wrong… before that we were talking about how Indian ppl, esp of lower caste/status are always saying how happy they are and sometimes they really do seem happy and sometimes it seems like them telling us this is their way of trying to convince themselves that they really are happy, its really interesting though bc they are like the ppl who are living underneath a sheet (or nothing) on the street and they are the most happy. And the ones who try to convince us they are happy tend to be doing better off.
anywyas this is long enough and I do have other thigns I could be doing like avoiding pub night and my papers for a while longer so laters..
~whitney
Ok so now this one’s from India and we are pulling out of the dock in20min so sad.
I LOVE India - like the ppl are amazing…. I went to a school fro disabled children and we did manual labor as well as playing with the kids - in my case it involved luggage books everywhere and categorizing them, others did garden work and painting murals. Playing with the kids and givin the stuff we brought to donate was the highlight of the trip and like this little girl came up to me and sat in my lap for no reason and wouldn’t let go of me - actually I have a girl on the ship who’s 7 who does the same exact thing too. Actually tonight I tried to take her to bed and she threw a fit bc she has to be with me for whatever reason… ok right now im actually about to puke bc the doxycycline (my anti-malarial) is not reacting well with my stomach and I like cant do anything anymore. And I refuse to buy a different one which is an option bc I have no money left to buy one with but anyways where was i?
Disabled children’s home - we got to chill the kids for hours and all the little girls there were fascinated with my braids and an interesting note: I got into several fights over whether or not im actually an Indian person or not - the braids finally persuaded that i am, in fact, American. But that’s was the beginning of the theme for the entire stay.
i participated in the nararatri celebrations which are a 9 day festival honoring female goddesses. 3 goddesses are honored and each one is given three days to be worshipped - unfortunately I do not remember which goddesses I think its durga, sarasvati, and laksmi but im probably wrong. Anyways for the celebrations a woman took us into her home, fed us, entertained us, let us take pictures of everything in her house, and then gave us gifts for having come. They even let us into their prayer room but only after giving the girls a brief detour (which scared us to death bc we thought we were in serious trouble) to tell us that if were on our period one is not allowed inside as place of worship bc its some sorta custom which they uphold…Um yeah they gave us like goodybags of stuff to take home with us including: coconuts, tumeric powder and leaves (for upset stomach/diarrhea and tumeric powder is a antiseptic as well), sandlewood powder (yay for sandlewood), bindis, mini statues, and a lil candylike thing.
I met these two lil girls on the street, latima and yasmin, and they were amazing. They were carrying a infant brother and their mother was nearby as well. The girls were begging us for food and money (it prolly didn’t help bc at the moment we had been standing in front of a bank waiting for some ppl to get rupees bc they didn’t do it while on the ship) and the mother was asking my friend ashley to go to the market and buy her a ring preferably a jeweled one - what happened to feeding her children? Why make the daughters care for the baby but whatever.
Anyways we went to the movies while here and saw this bollywood movie called bride and prejudice the movie was like an Indian spin on the reg one pride and prejudice and was hilarious… at one point they were in a U.S. Mexican bar with like stereotypical Mexican dress and behavior that was so wrong it was ridick but the best thing that got everyone was when they cut to a beach scene and on one side was a bunch of white ppl carrying surfboards and lifeguard equipment and on the other side was a HUGE black gospel choir singing but singing Indian music in blue robes on the beach… and it was like black on one side and white on the other - everyone had a ball with that scene. And the weirdest thing is that their movies have intermissions - at one point the screen went black and no one knew why and we were like uh and then finally the word INTERMISSION rolled across the screen and we were like ohhhhhhhhhhhhh ok. The whole movie experience, including food and beverage costs less than $3USD.
Even though we were told not to, and even thought if they get infected the hospital refuse to see us and our noses will fall off so many girls got piercings on this trip for the equivalent of $2USD. And cab or rather rickshaw rides across the city only cost a dollar or 45rupees. You have to bargain with them to get that price otherwise they ripping you off it gets to be quite fun… but the bad things is it gets you used to bargaining for like everything and not wearing a seatbelt. Ill also have to get used to seeing ppl wearing only normal clothing and like non-colored ppl which will be way weird.
In my psych class this guy who’s a complete asshole started talking about how Indian people are stupid for not having worked out a cheap sewage system and bc they have no place else to go the take craps on the street…. The guy like went on and on when the ppl have no money to o any of that stuff and when my teacher tried to intervene he told her she was wrong… before that we were talking about how Indian ppl, esp of lower caste/status are always saying how happy they are and sometimes they really do seem happy and sometimes it seems like them telling us this is their way of trying to convince themselves that they really are happy, its really interesting though bc they are like the ppl who are living underneath a sheet (or nothing) on the street and they are the most happy. And the ones who try to convince us they are happy tend to be doing better off.
anywyas this is long enough and I do have other thigns I could be doing like avoiding pub night and my papers for a while longer so laters..
~whitney