This country brings out the Flannery O'Connor in me. The chief difference between the two of us being that O'Connor wrote masterpieces of literature about life in the American South and I'm scribbling incoherently about India in a notebook, we still share an attraction to life's uncomfortable facets. O'Connor tends to shade her stories with someone's snotty nose or craft a hilarious plot around an awkwardly taboo subject, like a young woman's wooden leg. So many of the realities I used to turn away from or cover up – red betel juice spat in the gutter, greasy hotel pillows, what the men across the street stare for, middle-aged women without teeth, the satisfaction I get out of picking scabs, the way the grocer's ear hair curls over his ear lobes – are being taken out, turned over, and brought to light. I'm not sure why it feels natural, even necessary, to openly recognize these things here, but they pull at me like a distant lump on the side of the highway: you know what it's going to be but you just can't turn away. It's remarkable what a bout of Delhi belly can do to broaden your horizons.
What I'm finding is that it's okay to notice the dirt in your fries. At the very least, a bit of gritty humor can be extracted, and usually a glimpse at the honest, beautiful contradiction of being human.
6.25.2008
6.24.2008
The Indian Villa
My village days are a long time gone. A series of fortunate events have led me to make my home at the house of Sujeeta's mother on a quiet street in Coimbatore. Sujeeta Ma'am, as the students call her, is one of the lecturers at Nirmala College for Women, and since her mother moved out of the house, it has been vacant. Living in six months of dust is not a problem! My friend Heidi and I scoured the stone slabs in the kitchen and immediately began cooking western food: french toast, toast with butter and jelly, peanut butter and jelly...well, cooking is a relative term. And yes, everything we've been eating involves yeast bread. Except the other night I tried my hand at coconut rice on the gas stove, and it was pretty good!
One or two of my fellow students frequently pop in to spend a night in the city, and when Sydney came she named our little cottage full of Christian wall-hangings, mothballed trunks and dusty dishes “The Indian Villa.” We'll see if the resident mosquies and cocky-fellows (mosquitoes and cockroaches) will take to it.
Now that I'm close to the city, my research project is speeding along. My main focus is on collecting student's written responses to Indian literature and evaluating their critical analysis skills, but for context I do interviews and observe English classes. In the process of doing this, I've made an important discovery: the people I know personally are far more fascinating than the writings of authors far removed from me that I've been studying for years. Living, breathing stories are in each of the women I interview and from whom I gather writing samples. Their writing feels so much more real because I eat, talk, and argue with them, the authors. Literature has a context, and until I've felt and known it, my only interaction with that literature can be as a pupil. Having now felt and known India a bit, I feel better prepared to analyze its stories.
One or two of my fellow students frequently pop in to spend a night in the city, and when Sydney came she named our little cottage full of Christian wall-hangings, mothballed trunks and dusty dishes “The Indian Villa.” We'll see if the resident mosquies and cocky-fellows (mosquitoes and cockroaches) will take to it.
Now that I'm close to the city, my research project is speeding along. My main focus is on collecting student's written responses to Indian literature and evaluating their critical analysis skills, but for context I do interviews and observe English classes. In the process of doing this, I've made an important discovery: the people I know personally are far more fascinating than the writings of authors far removed from me that I've been studying for years. Living, breathing stories are in each of the women I interview and from whom I gather writing samples. Their writing feels so much more real because I eat, talk, and argue with them, the authors. Literature has a context, and until I've felt and known it, my only interaction with that literature can be as a pupil. Having now felt and known India a bit, I feel better prepared to analyze its stories.
The Indian Villa
My village days are a long time gone. A series of fortunate events have led me to make my home at the house of Sujeeta's mother on a quiet street in Coimbatore. Sujeeta Ma'am, as the students call her, is one of the lecturers at Nirmala College for Women, and since her mother moved out of the house, it has been vacant. Living in six months of dust is no problem! My friend Heidi and I scoured the stone slabs in the kitchen and immediately began cooking western food: french toast, toast with butter and jelly, peanut butter and jelly...well, cooking is a relative term. And yes, everything we've been eating involves yeast bread. Except the other night I tried my hand at coconut rice on the gas stove, and it was pretty good!
One or two of my fellow students frequently pop in to spend a night in the city, and when Sydney came she named our little cottage full of Christian wall-hangings, mothballed trunks and dusty dishes "The Indian Villa." We'll see if the resident mosquies and cocky-fellows (mosquitoes and cockroaches) will take to it.
Now that I'm close to the city, my research project is speeding along. My main focus is on collecting student's written responses to Indian literature and evaluating their critical analysis skills, but for context I do interviews and observe English classes. In the process of doing this, I've made an important discovery: the people I know personally are far more fascinating than the writings of authors far removed from me that I've been studying for years. Living, breathing stories are in each of the women I interview and from whom I gather writing samples. Their writing feels so much more real because I eat, talk, and argue with them, the authors. Literature has a context, and until I've felt and known it, my only interaction with that literature can be as a pupil. Having now felt and known India a bit, I feel better prepared to analyze its stories.
One or two of my fellow students frequently pop in to spend a night in the city, and when Sydney came she named our little cottage full of Christian wall-hangings, mothballed trunks and dusty dishes "The Indian Villa." We'll see if the resident mosquies and cocky-fellows (mosquitoes and cockroaches) will take to it.
Now that I'm close to the city, my research project is speeding along. My main focus is on collecting student's written responses to Indian literature and evaluating their critical analysis skills, but for context I do interviews and observe English classes. In the process of doing this, I've made an important discovery: the people I know personally are far more fascinating than the writings of authors far removed from me that I've been studying for years. Living, breathing stories are in each of the women I interview and from whom I gather writing samples. Their writing feels so much more real because I eat, talk, and argue with them, the authors. Literature has a context, and until I've felt and known it, my only interaction with that literature can be as a pupil. Having now felt and known India a bit, I feel better prepared to analyze its stories.
6.18.2008
Down in Kerala
Dance your cares away, worries for another day.
Let the music play down in Fragglerock!
Does anyone else have childhood memories of dancing around in front of the TV to that song? Remember the joy? I hope so, because that precise emotion was what I felt as I ran onto a bus bound for the railway station Monday morning. My overstuffed bag followed me on the bus to the train through the rickshaw onto the ferry and finally to a dry corner of a hotel in Fort Cochin, Kerala. It poured rain the entire time, so dry is a key word. Although the area is for tourists and every time I go outside I'm heralded with a chorus of “Madame! Come into my store,” it's still laid back and has a cafe called “The T-Shop” down the street. I would never have thought all of my wildest dreams could come true in one cafe, but when I saw waffles and peppermint tea on the menu, I realized they could. And they did.
My research group came to Kerala for a retreat, and it has been a much-needed and enjoyed break. I decided I could use a massage, so Liann and I ventured into an Ayruvedic ladies' beauty shop, and wow. That was a first. India is teaching me to be very comfortable with myself. As a woman in rural India, I'm expected to drape myself with three layers of cloth and keep my ankles covered; but in the city I'm expected to be okay to all kinds of exposure in the name of health. It's almost too much for the Western mind to handle, so I've begun adopting Eastern perspectives. Right now my sense of privacy is decidedly Eastern. With this in mind, if I stand claustrophobically close to you when I come back, just give me a gentle shove; I'll know what you're doing.
Let the music play down in Fragglerock!
Does anyone else have childhood memories of dancing around in front of the TV to that song? Remember the joy? I hope so, because that precise emotion was what I felt as I ran onto a bus bound for the railway station Monday morning. My overstuffed bag followed me on the bus to the train through the rickshaw onto the ferry and finally to a dry corner of a hotel in Fort Cochin, Kerala. It poured rain the entire time, so dry is a key word. Although the area is for tourists and every time I go outside I'm heralded with a chorus of “Madame! Come into my store,” it's still laid back and has a cafe called “The T-Shop” down the street. I would never have thought all of my wildest dreams could come true in one cafe, but when I saw waffles and peppermint tea on the menu, I realized they could. And they did.
My research group came to Kerala for a retreat, and it has been a much-needed and enjoyed break. I decided I could use a massage, so Liann and I ventured into an Ayruvedic ladies' beauty shop, and wow. That was a first. India is teaching me to be very comfortable with myself. As a woman in rural India, I'm expected to drape myself with three layers of cloth and keep my ankles covered; but in the city I'm expected to be okay to all kinds of exposure in the name of health. It's almost too much for the Western mind to handle, so I've begun adopting Eastern perspectives. Right now my sense of privacy is decidedly Eastern. With this in mind, if I stand claustrophobically close to you when I come back, just give me a gentle shove; I'll know what you're doing.
6.02.2008
Looking Up
Hot afternoons and cool evenings invite long hours of reflection at night. At least that's my excuse for lying awake. Yesterday evening I finished washing the sheet I sleep on and found it wasn't dry when it was time for bed. So I lay down on my mat and set to thinking. Sometime in the middle of the night I woke and slipped outside to pull the now-dry sheet off the clothesline. I anticipated the complete stillness, the gentle snoring sounds, the cool air. I did not expect the stars. I sat on the steps and enjoyed them; they were so bright against so much black. I could trace constellations and clusters even without my glasses. Stars hadn't shone so clearly for me since I sat on top of a trailer on top of a bluff above Strawberry Reserve last summer. The sky looked as though it would absorb the dark earth.
I could have stayed for hours, but the sheet crumpled in my arms felt so invitingly soft.
I could have stayed for hours, but the sheet crumpled in my arms felt so invitingly soft.
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