Sandy Does The Subcontinent

I’ve been back four days now and the jetlag is getting worse rather than better. At this point, I’m basically a house cat with intestinal issues. As soon as a patch of sun appears on my bed, I have an irresistible, primal urge to curl up in it and sleep. Then I’m up at all hours of the night. Although, the whole concept of waking and sleeping is an abstraction, since I’ve slipped into a twilight consciousness, complete with zero attention span and not being able to feel my legs while I’m walking. And maybe worst of all, I can’t use meal times to reset my internal clock, since my digestive system is firmly insisting that, “No, no, India food was just fine; it’s American food we can’t handle,” as though that was its stance all along and I simply hadn’t been paying attention.

In an effort to clear my head and keep myself awake, I figured I would make some highly subjective notes on what I think are widespread fallacies about the India travel experience:

1. India is total madness! – So as not to bury my lead any further, let me clearly state: India is not that crazy. I don’t know how it’s gotten this reputation as being a really difficult travel destination, but if you have traveled in Thailand, you won’t have a problem in India. In fact, it’s easier in some ways. Mostly because there is an extensive and efficient transportation infrastructure – trains, buses, boats, car services, and quite a few economy domestic airlines – and everyone speaks English.

Just do yourself a favor and stay away from the backpacker ghettos – they’re ugly, dirty and filled with wannabe hippies. Paharganj in Delhi is even more of a parody of itself than Khao San Road in Bangkok, and that’s saying something.

2. You are going to freak out at the extreme poverty – If you’ve never visited a major metropolitan area anywhere in the world, then yes, the poverty you see in India will be a shock. But I can say quite confidently that it is no more extreme or extensive than what you see on the streets of San Francisco or New York every day.

3. Foreign women get harassed constantly – Yes, men will stare at you in India. But you know what? Women and children will stare more. Staring is just a cultural thing. After a couple of weeks, I saw an East Asian woman in a crowd of Indians and I stared like my eyes were going to fall out of my head. People who look different are surprising and interesting and stare-worthy. That’s just the way it is.

In the two weeks on my own, I was out and about a lot, I explored everything, I took day trains and two overnight trains…and I didn’t have a single unpleasant incident. In fact, I was pretty much just left alone the entire time. Now, I have no doubt that a lot of foreign women have trouble, especially on their own (because if you’re with a man, you are invisible to Indian men), but – as difficult as it is to admit this – from what I saw, I think they bring much of it on themselves by disregarding basic cultural guidelines.

Here’s how to make your life as a solo female traveler in India a lot more difficult than it needs to be:

* Hold eye contact with men – this should be a no-brainer to anyone from a Western country because it means the same thing there that it does here: yes, I’m interested in having sex with you. OK maybe not that extreme but at the very least it shows interest if you lock eyes with a cute guy on the bus, right? Same thing there.

* Wear tank tops or long shorts – look around…do you see Indian women wearing this stuff? Enough said. Now go put on a salwar kameez, which is way more comfortable for the climate, anyway. If you have the attitude that a lot of Western women seem to have – “I can wear whatever I want and they just have to conform to my cultural expectations and if they don’t, I’m going to get pissed off at them” – well, maybe you should rethink why you’re traveling in the first place.

* Engage men in conversation – they will try to talk to you: where are you from, what’s your name, what do you want? Get it out of your head immediately that it’s rude to ignore them. What they’re doing is rude. They would never approach a single Indian woman and start following her around with a barrage of questions. It would be totally inappropriate. So follow that lead and give them cultural signals that they are behaving inappropriately – avert your gaze, wiggle your head, maybe hold up your hand if they are especially persistent…and they’re gone instantly. If you’re not sure what to do, just watch Indian people deal with Indian touts. Imitate and be amazed.

* Expect to get harassed – if you walk into it seeing Indian men as aggressive and sexist, you’ll probably end up at odds. If on the other hand, you accept that this is a culture that discriminates between the sexes – women get their own waiting rooms, their own queues and sometimes their own seating areas – and expect to get taken care of and treated as special, then that will probably be your experience. See this not as a lessening of your status as a person, but as an opportunity to explore your feminine birthright. Hey, it worked for me.

* Sit wherever you please – as a follow up to the last point: always sit with other women. People segregate themselves by family group and then by sex. It is perfectly acceptable for you to join a group of women and children. And once you get over the awkward intruding feeling (at least, I had that to start off with) you’ll be much happier there than around the solo men.

4. India is dirt cheap – It’s cheap by first-world standards, of course. But you definitely get less for your money than in other developing countries. I spent about $650, not counting two domestic flights, which I think were around $350 total. I was splitting the costs for half the trip, but that was balanced by doing a ton of shopping and staying in some pricier mid-range hotels. Overall, I’d say $30 a day is a reasonable budget. That’s about the same as my SEA budget but, like I said, you definitely get less – much lower food and accommodation standards – in India.

Maybe I’ll write more later but for now there’s a patch of sun on the bed that’s calling my name…

I’m home. The flights were easy and I had someone to pick me up from the airport, so that was nice. But now I feel lost. I feel disconnected in every way. My body is totally confused – it’s cold, it’s the wrong time of day, food is different. It’s all really disorienting and overwhelming which is leading to a bit of an emotional meltdown. Needy doesn’t even begin to describe. I’m just sitting here alone in my room, staring at the walls and at all the crap I have to unpack, unable to do anything but cry. I really needed company while I got re-oriented and back on my feet, but instead it’s back to my empty room and my empty life here.

* a hamburger (I want this so bad the cows have started to get nervous around me)

* salad

* banana bread

* olives

* pizza

* nachos and a burrito

* all the hot dogs

OK I’m going to the airport now. Bye!!

The trip is coming to an end. It’s been a big, crazy, wonderful trip – but what else would you expect of India? I got really sad the last two days in Varanasi, thinking about having to go home, and wondering if everything will be just the same as I left it. How could it be? The idea was unbearable.

Then I dragged myself out of my mope and got on a train back to Delhi, where I had hands down the best sleep I can remember having in a long time, maybe years. I fell asleep listening to my new All Time Best India Train Album Ever- Low by David Bowie – and slept the sleep of the innocent for a solid nine hours. I woke up a few times just long enough to wiggle around reveling in my comfortable sleepiness.

The trip went a bit long (five hours but hey, who’s counting?) so when I got to Delhi 17 hours later I started to rethink my plan to take the train then turn around and get on a 20 hour flight the next morning. But what’s done is done. Stef was here – yay! – when I got home to Delhi, and one health smoothie and warm shower later, I was right as rain.

Now I have my things strewn all over the living room, trying to figure out exactly how I managed to collect so much stuff over the course of a single month and how to get it all home. I’ve got to sort it out soon because I’m hanging out with my friend Rashmi tonight and then to bed (an early night, I’ve already laid down the law!), and then…and then I guess I’ll wake up in the morning, go to the airport and fly back to San Francisco. Weird.

[* All asterisked subjects are illustrated in order below]

Mornings are my favorite time in Varanasi. I get up at first light and head out through the narrow winding galis* (alleys) to the Dashashwamedh Ghat. It’s the big busy colorful ghat, so of course it’s my favorite.

I make sure the night before to get money changed into coins so I have a pocketful to give as alms to the beggars who line the stairs* leading down to the ghat itself. It is good karma work to give alms here. I’m sure I need it. Some people give bananas or rice but I give money because I figure that is the attachment that needs to be broken, for someone from the west.

Once down on the steps of the ghat itself, I usually head first for one of the holy men who sit at little puja tables under the tarps that cover the whole area. On the table there is a pile of marigold flowers, short lengths of twisted rope, shells with different colored pastes, incense, and a metal urn full of water. I sit down cross-legged in front of him while he says prayers of blessing and applies the paste in two dots – first white, then red – on my forehead. Then I hold out my hands, with the right hand on top, for him to put a marigold and piece of rope in it*. I put the left hand over the right and hold my hands together in a posture of prayer. He asks my surname and then prays some more. Next comes the part I’m not so good at – repeating the prayers, in Hindi or maybe in Sanskrit, I’m not sure, but they say them very, very slowly and clearly for me. At this point of the trip, I am generally used to being treated like a small, not too bright child, and accept it happily. When we are done, he touches my head in blessing again, and I drop a small coin in the metal urn. I go down to the river to give the flower and rope as a puja offering.

After I’ve done this, I just relax in the shade and watch life happening all around – people bathing, washing, fussing over the bride and groom of wedding parties*. When chai wallahs come around, I get a clay cup* of hot, sweet chai to drink quickly before smashing it on the stone stair. Clay shards are much of the litter that the sweeper ladies clean up during their frequent rounds.

After a few cups of chai, the air starts to heat up and I get hungry. So it’s back through the galis to the Brown Bread Bakery for a bowl of muesli, yogurt, fruit and honey. And so my day begins.

This probably isn’t the right place to start talking about Varanasi…or maybe it’s exactly the right place, I’m not sure. Anyway, the old town of Varanasi runs along the Ganges and there are a series of ghats (wide stone staircases) leading down to the river, where people bathe, wash clothes, do puja (giving offerings to the river), yoga…anything you can think of.

Some of the ghats are for specific rituals or uses; probably the most famous being Mankarnika Ghat, also known as the burning ghat. This is where families from all over India bring their loved ones to be cremated. To die in Varanasi or to be cremated here is a really big deal in Hinduism, so over 200 bodies are burned on the small slope each day. I spent some time on the ground near the ghat, just watching and walking through in between the fires, but then I watched the entire process from the balcony of a building overlooking the ghat, a building by the way where old people stay while waiting to die. Here’s what I saw…

First the family carries the body of their relative on a wood stretcher down to the river. The body is wrapped mummy-style in shiny gold fabric. They dip the body into the holy water of the river then set it out on the steps to dry, along with the others. After it’s dried, logs are stacked to create a platform, where the body is laid and unwrapped until only a light shroud remains. Rarely, families will uncover the face. I saw one of these and it was…strange, I guess. But mostly they are fully shrouded as they are anointed with butter, sandlewood, etc. A flame that has been lit from the eternal fire (said to have been burning continuously for 2,000 years) is brought down and the smoke is used to anoint the body before lighting the byre.

Then it burns. The family goes back into the waiting area overlooking the ghat for the three hours it takes. There are no tears or wailing because that would disturb the souls as they are liberated. Everyone is quiet.

When the body has burned, the eldest son goes back to get the part that has not burned – in men, the breastbone doesn’t burn, and in women, the pelvic bone doesn’t burn. The son takes the bone to the river and throws it in, before filling a clay urn with water. He takes the water back to the pyre and smashes it. With that, the connection between the loved one and the family is broken forever. The departed is truly departed; they are free. He turns around and forbidden to look back – even when he walks up the steps past the pyre, he hides his face.

I expected to be upset watching the bodies burn, especially when I saw the one with the uncovered face, but I wasn’t. The smoke and ashes were blowing in my eyes and mouth, and it didn’t matter because it suddenly became very, very clear – the most obvious thing in the world – that it’s no big deal. We are born and we die, and that’s all. In between we play a game called life but it’s just a game. A fun, funny, utterly wonderful game that we all play together, and it comes and it goes and it doesn’t mean anything. There’s no point to it. Which means there’s nothing I have to figure out or do or be or get. What is, is and what happens, happens. This may go against every cell in my high-strung, type A, overly intellectual and worrying nature…but I think I could get used to it.

Bodhgaya continued its lessons in acceptance when I was feeling a little nervous to walk to the travel agent’s to get my seating assignment confirmed last night…and halfway there, the power went out, so I was stranded in the dark, unable to see my way forward or back. Generator backup lighting eventually came on – luckily before I had a heart attack – so with that and candlelight from the small vendors I was able to find my way and the agent called to confirm my reservation and get my seating assignment.

Then when I got on the Doon Express to Varanasi this morning – the 5:15am train, might I add – my name wasn’t on the list posted on the coach to which I had been assigned and someone was in the seat. Since the TT (took me forever to figure out they were talking about the ‘ticket taker’) was “no available” – head wiggle, head wiggle – pretty much every single person on the entire coach took a look at my ticket and had long discussions in Hindi about what should be done. Finally, they just pointed me to an empty seat, spoke at me in Hindi and wiggled their heads. I wiggled my head and sat down, and everyone was satisfied. Some time passed before they all started gabbling about TT and pointing, so I followed the man who had just passed, and told him my predicament. Much discussion, inspecting of ticket and shuffling through passenger lists ensued, until a conclusion was reached: my seat had not been confirmed.

Now, this might have bothered me like, a week ago, but since I’m all India philosophical rad now, I just accepted it. The TT assigned me to an empty space a couple of coaches down, which turned out to be a top bunk sleeper so close to the ceiling I couldn’t even sit up, in another non-AC coach.

Oh wait, have I mentioned that I’m in the middle of a heat wave significant enough to make it onto CNN…in summer…in India? Yeah. Let’s just say that by 6am it was hotter than it’s ever been in San Francisco.

I spent the next six hours taking advantage of my newly resurrected ipod, to find the perfect soundtrack to a hot, crowded Indian train. Here are my findings:

* Justin Timberlake, Justified – Totally groove irresistible and therefore not advised unless you are fully committed to turning your trip into a Bollywood film. Which would be so amazing and if you actually did that I would be your best friend forever and ever.

* Wire, On Returning – A solid choice. I’ve rarely been so pleased as when Strange came on. “There’s something going on that’s not quite right,” indeed.

* The Postal Service, Give Up – The combination of calming and engaging makes this album a fine soundtrack, plus the rainy day romanticism lends itself well to gazing out a train window (assuming you’re not squished up in the top bunk of a non-AC sleeper coach, that is).

* Public Image Ltd, The Greatest Hits, So Far – Way, way too aggro. By the time This Is Not A Love Song came on, I was hyper aware of the heat and smells and how much I suddenly hated everyone around me.

* Paul Williams, Songs For The Family Of Man – This instantly took the edge off my PIL anxiety. Plus, the ridiculous juxtaposition of 70s AM hits and Indian trains is too great to miss.

* Neil Young, Harvest – Soothing and lends itself well to super hot weather. However, even though I love this album, it didn’t work out so well because it made me feel like I was just in a really bizarro Los Angeles. That freaked me out.

And the winner of the contest for Very Best Album To Listen To While Riding The Rails In India is…. Paul Williams!!!

Mary coined the phrase “India philosophical rad”; I think it was on the flight from Delhi to Cochin when one of the crew apologized over the PA for the inconvenience of a delay, then followed with something like, “But these things happen and there is nothing that can be done. They are out of our control so we must simply accept them.” Yep, that guy was totally India philosophical rad.

On the first pages of my journal for this trip, I wrote out a quote from “Paths to God: Living the Bhagavad Gita” by Ram Dass: “[Arjuna is] still attached to all his old values, his old definitions of himself. They are in conflict with the new understanding that is beginning to unfold for him, but they’re deeply ingrained, and he isn’t free just to drop them at will…And even more important, we have come to recognize that the choices facing Arjuna are the same choices facing us: How ripe are we to let go? How free of our egos are we ready to be? How willing are we to surrender to the mystery of God’s plan? Those are the questions confronting Arjuna. That’s the battle we face.” I thought a lot about this before the trip but then, since I have the mental focus of your average house pet, I promptly forgot about it in the fun, shiny distraction of India.

Last night it hit me – maybe this awful smackdown of the past few days is an opportunity I’m being given, to let go of my old ego models and to be released into the sea of life. It played out in a series of scenes since Monday: when I needed my ipod, it promptly stopped working; when I needed to feel physically strong and capable, I fell down and hurt myself; when I needed the kindness of strangers, I was met for the first time with cold indifference; when I needed to feel safe and nourished, I got food poisoning; when I needed the comfort of voices speaking English, the cable immediately went out. Everything I thought I wanted or needed – every attachment – was forcibly broken.

At first my response was the same as on my last big trip, which was precipitated by a similar domino effect – “I hate this! Things aren’t going how I want them to be, so I’m unhappy.” But if I’m only going to be happy when things are ‘good’, then I’ve completely wasted the past year of my life on a spiritual quest for freedom and balance that instead led right back to where I started. I saw that the only way to be that evolution was to put my mind where my mouth is, because I can talk about non-attachment and surrender until I’m blue in the face but if I still mentally qualify an experience as good or bad according to how closely it meets my expectations and desires, then those are just empty words.

Some part of my internal construct fell apart when I realized all this. Something shifted and I finally felt – really felt and not just thought – that it didn’t matter, any of it. I finally didn’t care – didn’t feel like I wanted or needed any certain thing. Healthy, sick, weak, hot, cold, what job I have, what city I live in, who I’m dating or if I’m not dating anyone at all, if there are people around or not, whether or not anyone helps me when I’m in trouble…it’s all the same, and the only thing I can do is be there in it and act with kindness.

Honestly, if this feeling lasts for even a day or two, then this whole trip will have been totally worth it.

***********************

As a postscript: after I went through all of that last night, I woke up feeling healthy, not sore or ill. The cable was on. At breakfast, the waiter brought me a bottle of water that was ice cold (something I’d unsuccessfully tried to find for days) and, with no explanation, an English-language newspaper. After breakfast, the hotel manager came up and knocked on my door because he hadn’t seen me in the morning and wanted to make sure that I was okay, “because if you were still feeling difficult, I would call a doctor to come.” And yes, after checking my ipod 43278 times since I got here, I thought I’d be crazy and dig it out of my bad to check it one last time… and it worked.