Friday, March 6, 2009

...no not indiana...INDIA

So i am in India:)
Yes this is true. Ive been here for almost a week days (honestly it feels like 5 months) and I have some things to say about it. None of them involving getting sick or coming face to face with a king cobra (thank krishna) .

The Arrival.
On Tuesday (i think tuesday) my friend Anna picked me up from the Delhi Airport around 10:30 pm. The flight over was quicker than i expected (14 hours?). I slept enough, and took total advantage of every movie, tv show, and brownie at my disposal . I had incredibly vivid Gaudiesque dreams/nightmares, one of which involved a small brain growing underneath my tounge, it got so large i couldn't speak, but when i showed it to my mom she smiled and said "OH that is perfectly normal!", so I picked it out--and carried on. (just LOVELY).
Once i actually landed, I couldn't stop laughing to myself "I can't believe Im here....holy shit. Elizabeth what have you gotten yourself into this time?" The smell of curry wafted into the airplane, throught the airport, and I just laughed even more. As I walked past the last security checkpoint with my bags I entered a long walkway lined with a croud of men wearing turbans about 4 or 5 people deep. holy sikh convention batman.

It was wayyyyy to easy to find her, the only white woman waving franically, smiling, woohooing--wearing a fitted jcrew blowse and huge smile (typical anna)---i RAN---we cried---we laughed--and all the indians looked at these two american girls giggling and swearing together, making unecessary hand gestures. we got into a cab, and anna took me to my palace for the night "Hotel Cottage Yes Please", and no I am not joking about the name. It came with a dog, cow, something burning somewhere out in front and wifi......mmmmmm wifi. what more could a girl from tennessee ask for?



Lucknow.
Lucknow is truly beautiful. The people are very inquisitive and friendly, the children at the nearby school flock to anna as she walks home after work--just like the momma hen she is.
 They love her (just like everyone loves h
er) and call her 'didi' (means big sister). The food is amazing, and so far I haven't been sick. This 1st week I really paid attention to what i was eating/drinking/etc, so now i slowly feel like I have sort of a sense of
 what is OK, and now I can move on to new things, so we will see. This is all really difficult to do since anna will eat and drink whatever--she has that iron stomach--that will never be me. ever.

Presently, there are two things Im having a difficult time with:
1) Deepmala cooking and washing my clothes
2) the 375,001 noises I here every night and morning while I attempt to sleep

I am trying to get used to having Deepmala-- slowly but surely this will happen. If I go home early from work, she will be in the kitchen singing songs. I stay outsid
e in the main room and tinker with stuff just to listen to her. She is younger than me, married with two children. Very patient with me and my lack of hindi, always smiling. She calls me didi now...i am very excited about all of this. Part of me secretly ENJOYS having a delicious dinner ready every night (who wouldn't enjoy this?), but the other part is frustrated. Frustrated because I am so limited here in the things i CAN do for myself--they go and take one more thing away from me! I can't speak the language, therefore I don't know where anything is, Its difficult to get around, I can't argue with the rickshaw drivers about how they are trying to steal my money. Anna's presence is required to ask about the gas, the bathroom, how to operate the hot water heater, the 34 locks on each door, which switch turns on which light....why only the driver in the car wears his seatbelt. you know just about everything.
 And now, I can't even cook and wash my clothes.  i know i know, i will shut up now and just enjoy it. 

The 375,001 noises oustside my bedroom window are as follows. They can be heard anytime between  the hours of 11:00 pm and 5:30 am. 

Mind you, this is not a complete list, but it sure is close...I listened carefully:

cars honking
mosquitos biting
bicycles
cows
dogs howling, whimpering, growling, talking, chuckling/playing cards
the train (yes there is a train of course)
birds that sound like monkeys
a futbol game
gorillas
king arthur's army 
the war of 1812
flies
a spanish bullfight
elephants
karaoke
techno music 
prayer
another louder prayer
gunshots (anna swears to me these are fireworks (it is wedding season) i don't believe her)
today's hindi lesson being repeated over and over in my head.

...and that pretty much sums it up.

I will post more later...







1 comment:

Take it, and Put it, and Tell me.

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