today in Pondicherry
Strangest thing I did today: Walked ten blocks barefoot through Pondicherry city streets, into an ashram, and eventually to a technicolor Ganesh Temple with a friendly live elephant out front. (The barefoot - not my idea. The tour guide insisted before we got out of the bus.)
Strangest thing I said today (to Rajev, who followed me all day and bought me lunch): "So, my guidebook says that Assam [where he's from, in northern India] is famous for tea and eroto-spiritual Tantric cults. You're familiar with Tantra?" [Let's just say if this weren't "Dayton Place" as Roberta dubbed it, your heroine would be getting lots of action.]
Strangest, most paranoid, thing I thought today: "This crushing headache could very well be cerebral malaria and I could be dead before the next sunrise. OR, this could be the first sign of a nervous system virus like Becky's [a Brit I met in Ghana] boyfriend got last time he went to India." [Um, nope, I was just hungry and thirsty. But I've been so scared off India that I wouldn't even take ice in my pomegranate juice and made them swear on their favorite Hindu deity that they did not put water in it. And the nervous system virus thing really scares me because it completely changed his personality.]
On that, I like India and it's nothing like I expected. Chennai and Pondicherry and the area in-between are sane, people are sane, and maybe I'll even emerge from this country without serious intestinal disorder.
Today's excursion was a really good one and I'm glad I went. The tour guide had a freaky similarity to Egyptian Sammy, but I just ignored him and surfed along and it was all good. Everybody else got upset with him and there was lots of shouting - in both Tamil and Hindi - and I looked at the pretty flowers and butterflies. Just the drive there was worth the 275 Rupees (about $6.50) - the scenery was amazingly beautiful. We drove along the Bay of Bengal and the tropical vegetation made my homesick for West Africa. And poor people seem to live pretty much the same everywhere - just the thatching on the mud huts is different here from Ghana.
And then we got to Auroville, and that was totally awesome. It's a planned city-in-progress revolving around search for universal truth, peace, and love. Though we're in Hindu-land, it's deliberately NOT religious. And I am so fed up with religion now that something based strictly on spirituality rather than religiosity rings rather melodiously.
There are churches here in Chennai everywhere (and televangelists), and Hindu shrines/temples, and mosques (though I don't see many, I sure hear the calls to prayer), and Buddhist temples. It's a melting pot beyond the cliche. And the travel information guy was cute when he said, "Happy Christmas." "Excuse me?" "Are you Christian? Is Christmas on the 25th of this month?" "Are you Hindu? Then, happy whatever temple festival they were having yesterday."
His intent was to be welcoming and accepting and conversational (so he could slip me his personal email address and phone number, hoping we'll "chat"), and in Jordan people weren't pushy. But if there were one thing I could change about West Africa, it would be the whole god thing. What the hell kind of name is "Thankgod"? Or Joseph (my non-husband)'s youngest son is named "Bless Lord." And these are pretty mainstream people. I need to figure out a better strategy for handling the Christian pushiness there without getting all bristly and defensive. I still am proud of myself for the retort to Dayton's pastors, "Well, I will respectfully disagree with your opinion that being born-again Christian is the only right way. Because I believe in love and acceptance of others more than I believe in any book or religious creed, and I'm pretty darn sure that I'm not wrong." [OK, I meant religious acceptance there, not idiot acceptance, clearly, because idiots like the pastors should not be accepted.]
Hey, another good reason to get back to Riverside soon - I can still catch the window on some fellowship applications for next year. That would be so awesome to have at least some income to allow me to just focus on research and then on writing. I can't wait to get back and get to work! Don't get me wrong - I have been so blessed to have this opportunity to go places I've always wanted to. But now I know what I want to do to let me do this kind of traveling again with purpose. And now I really know it's a small world after all.
Strangest thing I said today (to Rajev, who followed me all day and bought me lunch): "So, my guidebook says that Assam [where he's from, in northern India] is famous for tea and eroto-spiritual Tantric cults. You're familiar with Tantra?" [Let's just say if this weren't "Dayton Place" as Roberta dubbed it, your heroine would be getting lots of action.]
Strangest, most paranoid, thing I thought today: "This crushing headache could very well be cerebral malaria and I could be dead before the next sunrise. OR, this could be the first sign of a nervous system virus like Becky's [a Brit I met in Ghana] boyfriend got last time he went to India." [Um, nope, I was just hungry and thirsty. But I've been so scared off India that I wouldn't even take ice in my pomegranate juice and made them swear on their favorite Hindu deity that they did not put water in it. And the nervous system virus thing really scares me because it completely changed his personality.]
On that, I like India and it's nothing like I expected. Chennai and Pondicherry and the area in-between are sane, people are sane, and maybe I'll even emerge from this country without serious intestinal disorder.
Today's excursion was a really good one and I'm glad I went. The tour guide had a freaky similarity to Egyptian Sammy, but I just ignored him and surfed along and it was all good. Everybody else got upset with him and there was lots of shouting - in both Tamil and Hindi - and I looked at the pretty flowers and butterflies. Just the drive there was worth the 275 Rupees (about $6.50) - the scenery was amazingly beautiful. We drove along the Bay of Bengal and the tropical vegetation made my homesick for West Africa. And poor people seem to live pretty much the same everywhere - just the thatching on the mud huts is different here from Ghana.
And then we got to Auroville, and that was totally awesome. It's a planned city-in-progress revolving around search for universal truth, peace, and love. Though we're in Hindu-land, it's deliberately NOT religious. And I am so fed up with religion now that something based strictly on spirituality rather than religiosity rings rather melodiously.
There are churches here in Chennai everywhere (and televangelists), and Hindu shrines/temples, and mosques (though I don't see many, I sure hear the calls to prayer), and Buddhist temples. It's a melting pot beyond the cliche. And the travel information guy was cute when he said, "Happy Christmas." "Excuse me?" "Are you Christian? Is Christmas on the 25th of this month?" "Are you Hindu? Then, happy whatever temple festival they were having yesterday."
His intent was to be welcoming and accepting and conversational (so he could slip me his personal email address and phone number, hoping we'll "chat"), and in Jordan people weren't pushy. But if there were one thing I could change about West Africa, it would be the whole god thing. What the hell kind of name is "Thankgod"? Or Joseph (my non-husband)'s youngest son is named "Bless Lord." And these are pretty mainstream people. I need to figure out a better strategy for handling the Christian pushiness there without getting all bristly and defensive. I still am proud of myself for the retort to Dayton's pastors, "Well, I will respectfully disagree with your opinion that being born-again Christian is the only right way. Because I believe in love and acceptance of others more than I believe in any book or religious creed, and I'm pretty darn sure that I'm not wrong." [OK, I meant religious acceptance there, not idiot acceptance, clearly, because idiots like the pastors should not be accepted.]
Hey, another good reason to get back to Riverside soon - I can still catch the window on some fellowship applications for next year. That would be so awesome to have at least some income to allow me to just focus on research and then on writing. I can't wait to get back and get to work! Don't get me wrong - I have been so blessed to have this opportunity to go places I've always wanted to. But now I know what I want to do to let me do this kind of traveling again with purpose. And now I really know it's a small world after all.
posted by NOLA at 9:30 AM
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