India Marks Halfway

They say India is one of the most life-changing ports on our itinerary. This is the port that is supposed to nudge you in one of two directions: back deep, deep into your shell where everything is safe and familiar or willingly thrust you another few steps outside of your ever-expanding comfort zone. I definitely felt the tug in both directions during my six days in India. Homesickness finally struck. There was a moment where I was sitting on the bus traveling from Jaipur to Delhi, North Indian countryside and farmland whizzing by outside the window and I suddenly started tearing up. It was unstoppable. It was like my rush of a day visiting various forts and palaces had worn me down and tired me out so much that the feelings I’ve been subconsciously suppressing just rose to the surface. I really missed home. For the first time on this journey, I had shed tears for my life at home. I craved the familiarity, the interactions with friends and family, the routine. I thought I was doing so well too. I figured the reason why I was handling such a huge trip, so far away from home so well was because I had gotten over tear-worthy homesickness after my freshman year of college. Apparently not. Apparently I’m not as independent and grown-up as I thought I was. I am still dependent upon that familiarity and love from those I love in order to feel comfort. It’s tough being so disconnected. The hardest thing is experiencing stuff I’ve previously only dreamed about and wishing upon wishing that my family could be right there by my side experiencing it with me. I can only hope that they get the chance to see the world like I am.
Anyway, what all of this sentimental, mushy-gushy stuff led me to was the realization that not only is it okay to cry because I haven’t seen or talked to my family in over two months, but that I’m also not where I want to be in my own personal growth on this voyage. I have high expectations for what this kind of trip around the world can do to a person. I’m seeing it firsthand both in myself and in my classmates. What my tear session helped me to realize was how often I sort of rely too heavily on others taking care of me. It leaves me with no confidence in my own ability to do the same. I know I have the ability it’s just a muscle that hasn’t been stretched much. And I just may have stumbled upon the first exercise to get that muscle working. Over dinner on our last day in India, I was telling my roommate about my week, struggling to put words to such a multi-faceted experience when it was her turn to spill. First off, she said India felt strangely familiar to her. She felt at home and like she’d been there before when she hadn’t even come close to it.
Here’s a little background on my roommate. Her name is Alyssa. She is finishing up her last semester of college here on the ship but she spent her last three years at UVA. She’s from Singapore but has lived in Germany and China as well. She is a very independent person. She’s had to be with her going to school in the U.S. and her family being half-way around the world in Singapore. In most of the ports she has made it a priority to go out on her own for a few hours or even a full day. I thought she was crazy for doing so but each time without fail, she would come back with the best stories and the most intimate connections with the locals and their culture. It was while she was recounting her solo excursion through Chennai where she got to talking to an Indian family who took her out to lunch at their favorite restaurant and drove her back to port that I decided I needed to give the solo thing a try. It would be good for me. It would force me to step up and take control of my life in ways I’ve taken for granted. I told Alyssa this and she recommended I give it a shot in her home city of Singapore. So I am. Tomorrow we dock in Singapore and I am still on track to venture through the city all by myself. I’ll have a list of ‘must-dos’ courtesy of Alyssa but I’m really willing to just see where the day takes me. I hope I walk away with my own amazing story and new connections like Alyssa always does.
        Back to India. I struggled to describe it to Alyssa and I’m still struggling to try and describe it to you. There is so much to talk about. The place is just bustling and dirty and the homeless and beggars are everywhere, people are trying to sell you something at every corner, you’re more likely to see a polar bear than a trash can in India and the scene depicts that, families of five miraculously pile on to motorcycles, it’s normal to sit in the same spot for an hour to the cacophonous sound of honking and getting absolutely no where in rush hour traffic, the most extravagant and artistically adorned ancient palaces perch on mountains like they did centuries ago, monkeys swing from ruin to ruin, toilets take the form of a hole in the ground surrounded by pools of liquid you’re better off just assuming is water, women in beautiful saris stroll the dusty streets, unclaimed cows roam anywhere and everywhere (gas station, sidewalk, highway median… you name it), emaciated camels pull buggies of people from place to place, seemingly lifeless dogs collapse wherever the shade falls, rickshaws (open-air mini-taxis) dangerously weave through traffic taking their passengers usually to the wrong destination and for a ridiculous fee. That’s just a sliver of what is India. That’s only a sliver of the India I saw. I ran into people from England and France who were spending two months traveling all over India in the hopes of at least scraping the surface. I have never before been to a place that is so rich and diverse. You could spend a lifetime traveling through India and still not have experienced everything there is to experience.
        I spent my first day in Chennai, the port city where our ship docked. I set out with my roommate with no real plan of what to do other than maybe try and get a ticket to the cricket match happening that afternoon, enjoying a delicious Indian meal, and wandering the major marketplace, Tyr Nagar.  We selected a rickshaw based on which driver was least annoying and the most fairly priced. Turns out the cheapest one was a motorized rickshaw that only recently made the transition from man-power to motor-power. Our driver was excited to point out his ride’s new addition. We soon found out that motor-power did not mean anything but a deserved physical break for the driver. He didn’t have to pedal but we moved at a snails pace. If I were to have gotten out of the overly cramped carriage designed for a person two feet smaller than me, I think I could have out-WALKED the thing. Nonetheless, we felt it was the most perfect way to take our first dive into the country because we knew that experience was going to remain a unique experience. Never again would we opt for the newly-motored rickshaw over an auto-rickshaw.
Not surprisingly, our driver did NOT know where our stated destination was despite bobbing his head from side to side, the Indian’s equivalent of the up and down shake we’re used to. We’ve found through our travels in other countries that this is quite common and that when you introduce a language barrier, you’re best bet is to just embrace the unintended location you’re dropped off at. Instead of Tyr Nagar, we were dropped at a major shopping mall. We’re talking 4 floors of high-end shopping, food and cinema. It was just an indoor, air-conditioned version of what we really wanted. We decided to grab a bite to eat in the mall’s food court, our first Indian meal of the week. I ordered a chicken curry with pratha. Amazing. Amazingly spicy too. My undereyes were sweating. My throat, lips, and entire mouth was on fire but the pain was soooo worth it.
        After lunch we attempted to go see the cricket match. India is currently hosting the Cricket world cup. The match that afternoon was South Africa v. Ireland. Our source was wrong about timing because we arrived just as the match was ending. Oh well, we got to see the stadium at least. We hailed another rickshaw to head to Tyr Nagar, finally. The marketplace was bustling and busy. We stopped into a ready-made Indian clothing store. Trying to stay practical with my purchases, I did not buy an authentic Indian sari but I did get a beautiful green shirt and scarf. The decision process was grueling and complicated. Most Indian shops have thousands, if not millions, of fabrics to choose from. And the employees expect you to just walk in and know exactly what you want. Or so it seemed. They pulled hundreds of shirts out of their packaging to show me and I ended up going with something on a rack right next to me. It’s a pressure-laden situation. Let me recreate for you a typical shopping trip in India. You walk into the store with the intention to browse at your own pace and solicit the help of a sale’s employee when you have a question or are ready to buy. In India, there is no such thing as browsing. From their perspective, you ARE going to buy something and if you don’t it’s personal.  An employee immediately attaches themselves to you, pulls down scarves from high shelves, unwraps packaged clothing, forces you to try things on. All I know is, you are not the one driving the shopping experience and in most cases you end up with things you didn’t even know you needed or wanted and most times don’t need or want. Things are really cheap so it’s not the end of the world when you spend 1000 rupees on four shirts and five scarves.
Another miraculous trip by rickshaw back to the same mall we were dropped at earlier and we are now taking our seats in the front row of an even nicer movie theatre than you would find in the states. I say miraculous because I honestly am still trying to work out how I wasn’t in or witness to an accident in my high-speed, millimeters-away-from-hitting-an-old -lady, cow, school bus, and-motorcyclist, nearly tipping on sharp turns, trip to the mall. An act of God is the only explanation. Another miracle was arriving minutes before the start of an Indian film and successfully purchasing the last two seats in the theatre. Yeah they were front row. Yes the film was in pure Hindi without subtitles. Yes we were at the mercy of deciphering the storyline via facial expressions, setting, and the laughter of the audience but it was a BOLLYWOOD film in INDIA! How could we not do it this way?? By the end of the movie, I actually felt I had a good grasp on the plot. I even joined in the theatre’s laughter at times. I must secretly understand Hindi or something. Haha. I’m definitely going to be tracking down the movie and watching it with subtitles to see how well I did at deciphering the film.
Three and a half hours after arriving back at the ship, I was up and running at 3:30 in the morning for my trip to New Delhi, Agra, and Jaipur. We had a flight out of Chennai on Kingfisher Airlines. Best in-flight meal I have ever had. For a two and a half hour flight, we were served a full tray of Indian curry, toast, fruit salad, coffee, water, and tea. Plus I got to watch American television. It’s been too long!
The whole first day was spent sightseeing in New Delhi. We visited a bunch of landmarks I honestly can’t tell you the name of but they were old ruins, forts, tombs, and even Gandhi’s cremation site.
The second day we woke up bright and early for our train ride to Agra. Another amazing in-train meal and the company of four British travelers, left me refueled and inspired to make the most out of my time in Agra. The Brits had been traveling all over India for the past month. They had three weeks to go and were traveling from place to place via train. They had so many stories to share so the three-hour train ride flew as we traveled through monotonous, yet gorgeous, countryside as the sun was still breaking the horizon.
The first few steps off the platform at the train station were something I was not prepared for and something I will never forget for the rest of my life. Especially after such an enjoyable train ride with some friendly and familiar Brits.  Immediately we were thrown into a scene of women begging for money to help feed the babies they were swaddling in their arms, deformed men walking on all fours or swinging by their arms because they were legless, or the legs they had were blown up like balloons. There were children as young as three years old reaching for the water bottle in the side pocket of my backpack or begging for food. And then there were the relentless hockers trying to sell us useless souvenirs. The walk from the platform to our awaiting bus was maybe a distance of 20 or so steps but I felt like time was warping or something. The short walk was so rich with poverty and unsettling devastation. When we were on the bus pulling away, I looked down from my window and there was a little five-year old boy holding the hand of his three-year brother. His little brother was bawling. They were both so dirty and disheveled. Their hair and skin was caked in dirt and dust. Their clothes were mere remnants of the t-shirt and shorts they once were. To see such young children living in those conditions flat out broke, no shattered, my heart into a million pieces. I was brought to tears. I wanted to jump out of the bus and go put a smile on the little boy’s face, fill their empty stomachs, and give them a life they deserve. I remember thinking, if this is what I can expect for the next four days, I don’t think I’m going to be able to handle it.
Fortunately, the next three days were mostly spent fending off obnoxious hockers and visiting amazing palaces and forts. Among those amazing places was the Taj Mahal, a dream come true. When I first laid eyes on it, I actually think my heart stopped beating. I could not believe I was standing where I was. It was absolutely unbelievable.
The other highlight stop was our visit to the Amber Fort in Jaipur. It was an old palace that sat on top of a hill overlooking the whole city. It was gorgeous from afar but even more spectacular up close and personal when I got to see all of the hand-painting and extravagant detail on every surface. It quickly became my favorite location in all of the India that I saw. One of the best parts was ascending the hill to the palace on the back of an elephant. Yep, I rode an elephant up to a palace in India. Check on the bucket list right there.
Fast forward to the final day in India back in Chennai, after my amazing four-day overnight trip. I spent the morning at a local university learning about Hinduism, Islam, Jainism, Sikhism, Buddhism and Gandhi’s legacy of nonviolence in India from Indian professors. I spent the afternoon at one of Mother Theresa’s missionaries of charity playing with a bunch of children who used to roam the streets homeless. Sounds like a perfect last day to me. And it absolutely was. I was inspired by the dedication and passion of the sisters to their work at the missionary. They were so fully involved in taking care of these kids and providing them with the love they deserve. It was so apparent that they were doing exactly what they were put on this earth to do. I hope that whatever I spend the rest of my life doing, that I can do it with that kind of limitless, undying dedication.