Week 1

I can’t believe that it has only been one week since I left Canada, it feels like I have been in India for much longer than that. After only the first day here I felt like I had seen and experienced what I would normally see in 3 weeks!

The things about India that have surprised me or stood out most to me so far

The smells: As soon as I stepped out of the airport I was overwhelmed by the smells. Every couple of steps the smells changed, and although they were not all bad they were overwhelming because of how humid the air was. Thankfully I quickly got used to this and now I barely ever notice the smells, let alone am bothered by them.

The rules of the road: People in India drive so crazy! I have not been able to figure out how the rules of the road are set up, but there does seem to be some sort of unspoken system that keeps everyone safe as they weave in and out of each other and cross into oncoming traffic at what always seems like the worst possible moments. Driving in a rickshaw around the cities is so much fun! So is driving in the countryside. Yesterday we took a bumpy busride up a bunch of tight switch backs to the hilltown of Ooty. I am still surprised that we didn’t fall off the mountainside or run into a bus coming the otherway around one of the tight corners. Even driving in El Salvador didn’t seem this chaotic.

The head wobble: people do it all the time! (If you have never seen an Indian head wobble before I don’t know if I can describe it to you, you’ll have to try youtubing it or something). When I wave hello, they head wobble back. When I ask a question, they head wobble back. When I say thankyou, they head wobble back. When I make eye contact….etc

How safe I feel: For some reason I was a little bit afraid that I would feel like I was continually being cat called, grabbed at, or pick pocketed while I was here. It hasn’t been at all like that. All the Indian people are very polite and I can’t think of a single time that I have been catcalled since I arrived. Sometimes people will stare at us or ask us if they can have a picture taken with us, but this is just as likely to be a family as a group of men (and tends to happen only in touristy areas where there are groups of camera happy Indian tourists).

The continual noise and honking: In the city it is always loud. The honking never stops except for a brief period in the very middle of the night (we woke up around 4am this morning and the city was almost peaceful –almost). After only one or two days in the city it was a relief for me to get out into the countryside for some quiet, fresh air and free space. Thankfully the noise is something I am getting used to as well (although not as quickly as I got used to the smells).  

Some highlights of the trip so far

Auroville: This was just a short rickshaw ride into the countryside from our second hotel in Pondicherry. It is a kind of spiritual commune that was started in the 60’s and continues to attract residents and tourists to this day from all over the world. The coolest part about it was a giant (and I mean giant) gold plated dome that looked like a huge golf ball from outerspace. Although we were not allowed to go inside the dome to see the world’s largest crystal (that captures the sun in a way that helps concentration) because we were just visitors, we did get to see the dome from a distance. There was something very otherworldly about the structure and the manicured lawns around it, especially in contrast to the chaos and dirtiness of the rest of India I had seen so far. My favourite part about visiting Auroville was getting out into the countryside and renting some bicycles to explore the paths and roads around the commune. We had to dodge branches and fallen wires on our way because of the cyclone that passed through the area just a few days before we arrived in India.

Market in Pondicherry:  We have done a lot of exploring cities and wandering around bustling streets since we arrived. My favourite place to do this so far was the marketplace in Pondicherry. The streets were narrow and walking room only with vendors selling spices, fruit, clothing and other food and nicknacks crowded beside each other. It was fun to try some of the different fruit and buy some new clothing (I love Indian clothing, it is so much more colourful and comfortable than anything I would wear back home), but what I really liked the most was all the colours and all the beautiful old ladies sitting on the ground surrounded by the fruit they were selling.

Meeting my first elephant:  I got to see a temple elephant! It stands outside a temple in the middle of Ponticherry most of the day and blesses people by tapping them on the head with its trunk. I wish I could say that I got blessed by the elephant. I did try to get blessed by feeding him some grass but I guess that the man whose job it was to prod the elephant to do this didn’t see because he was talking on his cell phone at the time.

Beaches and the ocean: almost every place we have visited so far has been on the coast. On my very first day I got to walk across the huge sand beach in Chennai and put my feet in the Bay of Bengal. In Pondicherry I felt like a movie star strolling along the seaside in the classy French Quarter and sipping Chai at a seaside café.  But the best place to see the ocean was in Kanyakumari, at the verymost southern tip of India. There was a point within walking distance of our hotel where 3 seas meet (The bay of Bengal, the Indian Ocean and the Arabian Sea). I watched the sun set over one sea at night (from the rocks on the otherside of town) and rise over another in the morning( from my hotel window which had a beautiful view of the bay of Bengal). I’ll be honest, it was pretty cloudy for the sunrise and I didn’t actually see the sun until after breakfast but it was pretty spectacular to watch the crowds of people that had gathered by the coast to watch the sunrise and to listen to the singing and chanting from the dawn service at the church bellow my window.

Lowlight of the trip so far

Being sick on the train: Everyone told me I would be get some kind of travellers diarrhoea or food poisoning - I was just hoping that I would stay healthy for a little longer than a week! All in all, it wasn’t so bad (haha I can say that now that I am feeling better).  I was unlucky enough to get sick right as we were setting out on an overnight train ride. This was the second train ride that we had taken so at least I knew what to expect. The bunks are set up three on top of each other with members of our class often mixed in with Indian travellers in each compartment. The toilets are at the end of each car and although there is one western style toilet on each car the other three are squat toilets that empty right onto the tracks bellow.  Let me put it this way – I fought that nasty bacteria out of my body and into white paper bags that are now all along the train tracks from Kanyakumari to Coimbatore. I think it will be at least a day or so until I am up for eating another spicy curry.

I hope you are all doing well and enjoying the snow back home!

A bientot,

Abby

Ps. Pictures coming soon when I get a better internet connection