In the past two months I’ve carved out a fairly regular pattern of life here in Varanasi.Every morning I wake up at 5 a.m., take a walk along the Ganga, have a cup of chai or two, go to work, come home, have dinner, read, chat with or visit friends.I’m usually asleep by 10:30 p.m.
All but the most tenacious tourists have now left Varanasi for the mountains.The daily temperature is now upwards of 40 degrees, and I can’t seem to drink water fast enough to replenish the water I’m sweating out.To add insult to injury, while I lug around as a salty, pasty mass of damp cotton, the Indian ladies around me float radiantly and sweat-lessly on clouds of cool air, smelling of jasmine and fresh cucumber.
I’ve just returned from a week in Nepal where I attended what is reported to be the World’s Largest Passover Seder.At first Nepal seemed to be an unlikely place for the gathering of thousands of Jews.But when I stepped out of my taxi in Kathmandu and into my guesthouse, the Varanasi Mystery of “where did all the Israelis go?” was quickly answered.The thousands upon thousands of Israelis who spend a year or two traveling in and around India after their army service head north to the mountains in India and Nepal during the hot months.
The seder was held in the hall of a big hotel in Kathmandu.There were estimated to be over one thousand Israelis there, and the service inside was conducted in Hebrew.Outside, two small tables were set up for about 60 of us mainly non-Hebrew speakers.I sat with a very interesting group of people.
I sat across from a young male Nepali engineer who had been brought to the seder by his elderly Jewish Norwegian friend.This Norwegian had been visiting Kathmandu for the last 20 years and staying at the family guesthouse of this Nepali boy.The Norwegian sponsored the Nepali’s education at a university in Stockholm, Sweden.The exotic woman beside me, who identifies as Christian-Muslim-Jewish, is fluent in eight languages, including Hebrew, and has never lived anywhere for longer than four years.She is currently living in Gujarat, India, and is a former resident of Germany, Jordan, and Canada (Montreal).
I also met a Thornhill Jew who was in the process of making a documentary about the phenomenon of “Bu-Jews” – Jews who study and follow Buddhism.Apparently he was struck by a statistic that 30% of Buddhist converts in America are Jewish.This prompted him to explore the reasons for this phenomenon and he has spent the past months interviewing and filming Bu-Jews all over India.There was also a large group of American students who are participating in a study abroad program in Kathmandu.
I was very lucky to meet a fun Bu-curious Dutch girl who was looking for a trekking partner to join her for a few days before she started her 10-day meditation/Buddhist philosophy class at a Kathmandu monastery.We did a 3-day hike in the Kathmandu valley area and were extremely lucky as we work up on our first night to a perfect sunrise and view of the Himalayas (which had apparently been obscured by haze for 10 days prior).The most memorable moment was watching the sunrise from the temple perched above our guesthouse in Nagarkot.
We spent my last night in Boudha – a quiet and beautiful Buddhist area of Kathmandu.Boudha is full of Tibetan monks and also has a significant population of Westerners studying Buddhism.We met an interesting group of Mexicans and Canadians who had come to Boudha for study and enlightenment.
I’m now back in Varanasi, trying to get all my projects competed before I leave on April 23rd.Last night a friend and I escaped to the new “IP mall” – an American style, heavily A/C’d mall.I cooled off by eating an ice cream sundae and drinking a cold coffee and we watched locals practice riding up and down on the escalator – for many it was their first time using one.Tonight I have to run a few errands and then will try, for the fourth time, to make it to my friend Nitu’s roof before the sun sets.I always seem to arrive half an hour too late.
I’ll be spending four nights in London before returning to Toronto.I’m staying with my friends Gemma and James and am hoping that my friend Jesca, from Holland, will be able to join me for a day or two.
I've added some more photos. The first set are from Holi (or the "Festival of Colours" - well actually post-Holi. Holi in Varanasi is a bit nutty and so as women (especially foreign women) we were advised to spend Holi locked inside. Luckily there were a group of us who were able to spend it together in the WLC palace, which has a great view of the Ganga and all the craziness along the ghats.
Hello all! I've updated the snapfish site with a few more photos. It has not been easy to upload so I've just added a few and once I figure out how to upload faster, will add some more.
This is an incredible city - perhaps only comparable to Jerusalem in terms of the feel. It is one of the holiest sites in Hinduism. Pilgrims come from all over India to pray, cremate their relatives and bathe in the sacred River Ganges. Along the west bank of the River is a series of ghats, which are steps that lead down to the river. At any given time while walking along the ghats one can see children playing cricket, locals selling flowers, people bathing in the River, boats (and the many "boatmen" trying to sell their services: "Boat Madam? Madam, boat?"), men sipping chai beside small wooden chai stalls, tourists taking photographs of poor children, people praying at the many temples along the River, men peeing, men leering, men chewing and spitting paan, bulls chewing and spitting, people trying to avoid spit and poo, families collecting bull/cow poo (used as fuel and for walls and floors), stoned hippies staring into space, stoned religious men staring into space, begging women, begging men, begging children.
On the work/volunteer front, I'm really enjoying my time at WLC. Yesterday was an amazing day. I went with one of the staff to a rural site to interview women who had taken loans from their "Self Help Groups" to purchase sewing machines. SHGs are groups of up to 20 women who all contribute 20-30 rupees each month to the group's savings. The group can decide to lend women within the group money from the group's savings as needed. Among other things, I'm writing up "success stories" for WLC reports and publications. These women had effectively doubled their household incomes through the sale of their products in their communities. Both women learned to sew through the WLC sewing training centre in their community. You'll see images of the two women I interviewed (with the help of Neetu's translation) on the snapfish site.
Last Friday I moved into the guesthouse just across from where the WLC is located. I have my own balcony with a partial view of the Ganga. I love it (and at the rate of approx. $2.50/night, it will be hard to leave!).
I arrived in Varanasi on Saturday and I plan to stay and volunteer here for about two months. I arrived just in time as I had just about reached the point where I was touristed out. I don’t know how people travel continuously for a year. But then again, I’m someone who takes great comfort in routine. I love going every day to the same Bridgehead coffee shop and ordering the same medium skim latte at the same time with the same people. It isn’t that I’m homesick or that I am tired of India. But I have a strong urge to stay put, see the same people every day, make some real connections, develop routines, and not have every conversation centre around where are you from… where have you been … where are you going…
For me there is something tiring and a bit stressful about backpacking and backpacker culture. It feels like we expend a lot of energy in pursuit of the “authentic experience” - trying to get off the tourist track to mingle with locals in their natural habitat. There is an implicit hierarchy of tourist experiences where in trading stories extra points are always awarded to those who discovered the undiscovered beach or were invited into a local’s home (eg: “They’re so poor but so generous – they insisted we all drink their chai *and* they gave us the best homemade sweets we’d ever had!”). I went with one woman I met for a Pizza Hut dinner which sent her into an existential dilemma – did eating at an American chain mean that she was a “touristy tourist”? Was she selling her backpacker street cred for a greasy deep-dish pizza? She resolved to eat the pizza and to never mention this slip to anyone. Of course, this quest for authenticity is all part of the larger pressure to maximize one’s tourist experiences: see everything, eat everything, experience everything. After all – when am I next going to be in Mysore? Many seem to be happily immune to this kind of pressure, but sadly I’m not that evolved a tourist.
Before arriving in Varanasi, I spent about six days in Pondicherry where, with few exceptions, I spent my days working in the mornings and then wandering around in the late afternoon and eating dinner at the same place each night. I did have an ayurevedic massage on day 2 – but I can’t quite find a way to describe it and still have it qualify as appropriate reading material for all ages. To give you some idea - think two masseuse sisters, a canola field’s worth of oil, and enough direct skin-on-oily chair/-oily wooden table for my relaxation to be punctuated with bouts of anxiety re: previous guests and the potential for transmittable disease.
I arrived in Varanasi not quite knowing what to expect. I’d set up my volunteer position at World Literacy Canada (WLC) quite last minute at the suggestion of my friend Tina who had worked for this organization a few years ago and had a very positive experience. I was supposed to leave for Israel on February 16th to do an internship position there through the Professional Internship Program run through their government. But as my time here went on, I felt that I would be missing out by leaving India so soon. I’d not actually heard from the Israel program in a while and had not been informed about what I was to do upon arriving in Israel. As it turned out, yesterday while checking my email at a café in Varanasi, I got an email from Israel telling me that their Internship program had just been cancelled. (Good thing I hadn’t booked my plane ticket to Israel.) How is that for karma?! Om….
Here in Varanasi I’m staying at a friendly family-run guest house about 10 minutes walk from my work here (at a rate of about $3.75/day). I’m not sure what my project is going to be yet. WLC runs quite a few interesting programs – I’m hoping that I’ll be able to get involved in their advocacy and social entrepreneurship programs in particular. In the past two days I’ve been helping with various administrative tasks and getting to know the three awesome Canadian CIDA interns (all women) who have been here for six months and are sadly (for me) leaving next week (not so sadly at this point for them – I’ve been listening to them fantasize about hamburgers, sushi, hot showers, privacy, and lack of leering men back in Canada.…).
I’m sure I’ll be writing lots about Varanasi in the next few weeks (see also Lisa’s awesome blog about her trip here – www.lisaincalcutta.blogspot.com) but so far I really love it here. The WLC office is in a beautiful building owned by the King and overlooking the Ganges River. On my first night here I met an Israeli tourist (who was stopping through on his way to Nepal) and the two of us explored the ghats and took a boat ride down the Ganges in the late afternoon/early evening.
Tonight I’m taking my first Hindi lesson with a tutor who was recommended by the interns. Wish me luck!
As always- please send news as I miss you all! Luv Nadine
Hello from Pondicherry! This will be a very quick update – it has been a crazy long (but good) day here.
My host family in Chennai gave me a small glimpse into the lifestyles of the rich and famous in India. I stayed with Prasanna and her two children in their large central apartment (with their driver, cook and maid). But the Chennai apartment is not Prasanna’s main home. She lives in a town a few hours away in what she described as a “sprawling mansion.”
On my first day at Prasanna’s place, one of the highest ranking officials from the Tamil Nadu police force dropped by for a coffee. As a side note, I asked this officer (in my hopelessly non-politically astute way), who had worked in all areas of federal and state policing, about his views of the effectiveness of the different facets of the police in India. His mouth went into a half-amused/half-annoyed curl and looking me in the eye he said: “All aspects of the Indian police are excellent.”
Prasanna invited me to attend the mendhi party for the wedding of the grandson of a very famous Indian actor (considered the “Godfather” of South Indian cinema and to whom there is a statue erected across from that of M. Gandhi in Chennai). The father is also a well-known actor. Actually, the grandson was marrying his first cousin. The mendhi party was plush beyond anything I’ve seen before. It was held in one of the famous Taj hotels. There was an extensive and professionally choreographed dance show put on the by family, live drummers, a fantasy-garden of food, expensive gift bags, beautiful dresses and people. Aside from having my hand decorated with henna, I spent the evening watching the dancing, eating, and chatting to movie directors. Apparently the wedding (held the following evening) was attended by top Indian politicians and Bollywood actors.
Mahabalipuram was quite the change from Chennai: a laid-back backpacker’s haven full of white European yoga fanatics. During my two days there I had a private (free) yoga lesson by a Belgian yoga instructor/style consultant/aromatherapy/dietician on the roof of my guesthouse (she offered me a lesson after I agreed to switch rooms with her. Her old room had bad energy after her breakup with another yogi who left to go back to Sweden), discussed communicating with spirits and animals with a Swiss man who practices Shamanism, and puked my guts out after drinking juice which (I discovered too late) contained a rogue ice cube.
Today in Pondicherry I took a city bus tour and met a fun Irish woman who seems to like eating as much as I do. Tomorrow we’re having an ayruvedic massage – which promises to be another interesting experience.
Lots of other stuff has happened but I’ll have to keep this one short. Miss you all and send news!
I am so crazy ITCHY! I'm really only updating my blog so that I keep my fingers occupied for a bit so that I don't continually scratch the zillions of mosquito bites that are currently covering my arms, legs, face, hands, elbows, neck, ears, feet, back, ankles.... Chennai- last time it gave me runny poo and this time it left me looking like the victim of some terrible skin disease. And yet, I've left Chennai (now in only slightly less mosquito infested Mamallapuram) and am once more returning to Chennai two days from now. My host family in Chennai invited me to attend the weddnig of the son of some ultra famous Indian actor (whose name I can't recall at present)... and so, how could I say no? I shudder to think about what gross ailment I'll leave Chennai with next time. I once asked a doctor friend about the strangest medical issue she'd ever seen and the answer was "milky white stuff oozing from a patient's belly button." I really hope that doesn't happen. That would be truly gross. And given that I'll be wearing a sari to the wedding that may very well show my belly button, it would be particularly unfortunate. If you are still reading this, you are a trouper and perhaps a bit of a gross ailment fetishist, like me. If you are, I recommend that you go to the science library and take out a book on skin conditions. Really unbelievable and engaging stuff. Shoot- I just figured out that I can type with one hand and scratch with the other! Aaaarrrgggg!
