India

knoI may be completely off base, but I think there will be a point in my future when I live in India. Maybe for two months, maybe for a few years. But I loved too much about being there to not go back for longer. I know three weeks isn’t exactly representative of living somewhere, and I know I missed the hottest and wettest time of year, but I felt capable of dealing with what came my way.

I ate so well. I am very much a meat-eater, but I ate chicken probably three times while I was there and didn’t miss meat at all. The breads are wonderful – baked, buttered, stuffed, fried, puffed, wheat, white, soft, crunchy, delicious. The vegetables are tasty and their sauces are spicy and filling. The tea was sweet and satisfying. The lime soda was cold, sweet and satisfying. The fruits were fresh and flavorful. The snacks were all pretty unhealthy but very delicious – we ate too many samosas and pakora, too much pani puri and those potato things that I love. But I just couldn’t stop myself! There were ice cream and gelato stands everywhere – we could get a cone for less than twenty cents at eight in the morning. We could and we did.

And there was so much to see all the time. I think that’s why people stare. They aren’t just staring at me as a foreigner, they’re looking at everything. I noticed people usually woke up early, took a nap in the afternoon and stayed up late. So at really any point in the day, people were milling about. Hanging out or buying things. Working or just sitting on the side of the road, watching for something exciting to happen. Shops didn’t open until ten or so, but they stayed open until nine at night. The local markets didn’t open until the afternoon, and you could find anything if you looked hard enough. There were air-conditioned shops selling chintzy knick-knacks that were appealing because they were western and had English on them. There are outrageous jeans and silly shirts in department stores. Or there are open markets for buying bindis or sold baby clothes or fabrics or wholesale newspapers, magazines and books at 1/3 the published price. If there was a need, people figured out a way to provide the service.

Of course there was poverty and times when life there gave me a heavy heart. When we left in the early morning, we saw men waking up and packing up their makeshift rooms from storefronts and alleyways. Train stations were full of aggressive beggars who were pimped by someone or the government and had perfected a non-existent limp or deep, watery eyes. Small kids and animals were everywhere and seemed attached to no one. Maid servants were commanded and expected to be invisible in some of the houses we visited, and women were expected to take care of all domestic affairs.

But compared to Bangladesh, India was progressive. While women were expected to take care of the house, Kavi’s fufferji and cousin did help bring out food and clear away dishes. Kavi’s cousin’s wife only got married on the condition that she could have a job, and many women were demanding independence. They were driving, they were traveling alone, they were studying what they wanted and they were creating a voice. I stayed in houses where there was no live-in maid servants; instead, they paid someone to come in once a day to clean. I got to see an actual middle class, which most people claim doesn’t exist in India.

It’s just a neat place. I talked to people in Mumbai who seemed worn out from trying to see this country via second-class trains, broken English and lots of hand gestures. A new town or city every other day. Constant paranoia that they were being chumped, kidnapped or hurt by every Indian face on the street. I don’t think that’s the way I would travel here. There is so much I didn’t get to see, but I think if I came back I would find a spot to live. Then I would make friends and see India with them, the way they would travel. It was much richer experience to travel in a country with country(wo)men who helped me experience a place as it is meant to be experienced. A Lonely Planet is helpful, but with only that and your own cultural baggage, you wind up with some neat pictures, a lot of headaches, probably a lot of sickness, and a sense that you missed something even when you tried to see everything.

As many people know, I’ve joked for a few years that I want to be an Indian princess. I’d never want that life, but I would mind being able to get mehendi and samosas when I want… at least for a little while.