The Economics of the Auto-rickshaw driver

So here is where my life is right now. I wake up, shower, suck down some chai and head out of my room around quarter to nine. I hail an auto and barter him down to about 60 Rs. for my trip that will amount to aprox. 12 km. The auto takes me to Safdarjung Enclave, to WomenPowerConnect, the NGO where I work. From 9 to 5 I spend the day researching and organizing programs that bring together grassroots level activism and government level policy. After work, I head into the city for the evening, checking out markets, coffee shops, bookstores, music and food all over Delhi. Back at the guesthouse I chill, watch some HBO, read, sleep. And I have to say, this is the best experience of my life.

WomenPowerConnect is the most empowering, invigorating, dynamic place to work. This past week I have been writing a concept note on bringing together the two different Indian ministries to address gender-based violence through gender mainstreaming practices, protocols and policies. Friday I met with an officer from the World Health Organization, (thequirkiest and most adorable Indonesian woman). Can I just say that I am exploding at the opportunity to have meetings at the World Health Organization! Working for WPC is opening my mind in ways I had no idea were possible. The secondary level of activism is brilliant. WPC organizes grassroots organizations and brings their concerns to government agencies through effective lobbying efforts. The worst part for me is deciding whether to be more involved with grassroots program organizing or legal/policy affairs. I guess I’m in the right place if they are both interesting to me.

Outside of work life is great too. Everyone I’ve met is really friendly; everywhere I go there is something new to experience. I am in love with the bustling city. It NEVER quiets down and I absolutely love it.  Last night we hung around Kamla Nagar, which I guess, I could equate to Dinkytown in Minneapolis, because it is the market that sprung out because of the close proximity of Delhi University. Except it is about 100 times more intense than Dinky town and ridiculously large. Ugh! I can’t express… I’m putting up some pictures. 

The view during my getting pumped up in the morning time/de-stressing in the evening time.
Here is the entry gate to WPC. The office is complete tucked away in back street of S.J. Enclave. The average passerby would be completely unaware of the magnitude of ideas and action being processed.
Yeah, inside the autos it's basically a heat tornado. There is no point in trying to look nice for work because by the time I'm there I'm disheveled and drenched in sweat.
Here are Shiva and I in Janpath (Central Delhi, south of Connaught Place). After she got her LSAT score we took her out and bought her a necklace at The People Tree (a absolutely incredible indie-avant garde shop in Janpath). I got a similar necklace of the face of a person going crazy (as Shiva interpreted). Shiva said any time I feel like I'm going crazy I should touch it and it will help me deal. I adore Shiva, she is going to be India's greatest diplomat some day.

DELHI!

Namaste all! Alright to paint the picture: Right now I am sitting in a coffee place called "Café Coffee Day" They are all over Delhi. I look like absolute garbage because it is 110 degrees.  There was a table of four Indian guys next to me and every time I looked up for like the past twenty minutes they would all be staring at me and then they would see me look over and start giggling. I find this hilarious because there is dust and sweat caked to every crevice of my body right now. 

 

Yesterday I moved into my new digs in central Delhi. I'm staying at guest hotel just south of Connaught Place (if you want to look it up on a map). I moved in yesterday afternoon and have been exploring the city since. First off, I'm flying solo now as my travel sisters have moved to Rohtak to continue researching for Kavita. Yesterday I took the metro, which was really nice, not to crowded surprisingly (it's relatively new) and super cheap. Something like 6 rupees each way (48 rupees = 1 USD). Otherwise I've been traveling by auto rickshaws which are basically glorified scooters. They are pretty cheap also and I take them for longer trips. The two markets that I've been frequenting for clothes, books, supplies for my internship have been G.K. M and N.  Both have loads of westerners (and by loads I mean maybe 1 for every 500 Indians), and nice shops where I don't have to barter.

A lot has gotten lost in translation as I've been interacting with various people, but I am picking up more and more Hindi and nothing too disastrous has happened yet. Like I said, I start my internship tomorrow. Can't wait to update everyone on what that entails, can't wait to find out myself!

The room I have is great! It is the first place I've stayed with warm water in the shower which is pretty great. I almost ended up in the red light district last night when I was out and about which was terrifying. Ok, now I'm just rambling. Wait, one last thing, the guy who brings tea to my room and food is adorable. I think he might be one of the only people in the place that speaks english and that's why they always send him. His name is Abaw or something... he always insists on putting sugar in my tea himself, even though I tell him I can do it. He also stares at my ankles...lol oh god this trip is incredible.

Meri Yatra (My Journey)

Wow, what a whirlwind trip. I can’t believe it flew by so quickly. I just got back into Delhi after our team’s eleven-day research trip. Alright, I think before I launch into all of the super surreal parts of the trip I’ll give a brief (as brief as possible) overview of the project. Basically what the work in our trip entailed was surveying what are called “Sarpanches” and “Pradhans” in the states of Haryana and Himachal Pradesh. Both Sarpanches and Pradhans  (the same thing but the states have different names) are essentially local government positions similar to city mayors in the states. The Sarpanch/Pradhan is the head of the village council and leads/make development and policy decisions for villagers in India. In 1992 this entire system (of decentralized and local government within the state) was formalized in the Panchayat Raj Act. Also in this act was included a 33% reservation or quota for women for the position of Sarpanch/Pradhan.  What our study is doing is interviewing both men and women in these positions to gauge whether the reservation has effectively empowered women.

So! On to the trip!  Our first night we stayed in Chandigarh, which is the only ‘planned’ city in India. It serves as the capital of both Haryana and Punjab and is a really clean and fun city. We stayed in a government guest hotel which was absolutely beautiful. Here I thought I would be sleeping on dirt floors. This place was absolutely majestic. Other notable parts about Chandigarh were Sukna Lake, which I wish I would have taken a picture of.  The first morning in Chandigarh, Kavita and I got up really early and went for a walk around it as the sun was coming up. The park surrounding the lake was really nice and the sun was rising over the hills behind the lake. Believe it or not, more intriguing was my conversation with Kavita. She is a completely brilliant woman, totally strong, and aware, and yet perfectly traditional. Her and Pareena met at the IAFFE conference several years back and they are the most adorable best friend couple.

Maybe our second day in Chandigarh (we stayed two days) Diksha, Shiva and Himanchu took Dot, Katie and I to “Rock Garden”, which is the COOLEST sculpture garden,  made out of only recycled materials. Ok, I’ll back up a bit. Shiva (16) and Himanchu (14) are Kavita’s children. They are incredible. Completely the most kind and loving people also goofy, fun, outgoing, talkative. I have fallen completely in love with them. Diksha Di  (24) is also fabulous! She is Kavita’s niece and is beyond description.  She is currently working on her MBA in Bangalore and spent the earlier part of the summer interning for TATA motors if anyone is familiar. Diksha has the most funloving soul in existence. She has zero inhibitions and I would be shocked to ever see her without a genuine smile. Her combined with Shiva and Himanchu absolutely electrify any situation. So back to the Rock Garden…totally surreal. It was huge and basically a giant playground/maze. If you can picture an Indian style Rivendale (Lord of the Rings) you are getting close to understanding Rock Garden. Later we went to a urbanite paradise called Sector 17. Loads of Indian hipster clothing stores, coffee shops, book stores, etc. Hanging out with these guys was the best. Alright I need to move a long with the trip because I’m only two days in!

From Chandigarh we went to Una (in Himachal Pradesh). We stayed one night. There were loads of roaches in the bathroom of our hotel room. Katie and Dot were terrified. I killed the roaches with my shoe and then ants carried their dead bodies away. Nuff said.

From Una we went to Kullu! Kavita had gotten us a cabin which we really knew nothing about except that it was a “Forest Guest House.” So, here’s the thing about India. No one uses maps, or ever knows where they are going. When they don’t know where they are, they stop and ask. We did this for 8 hours!! It was dark and we had been driving up a mountain for a LONG time. We finally got OUT of the car and started walking. It was gorgeous out and with our team, nothing was ever tasking, always fun and lighthearted. So we walked…and we found the cabin! It was really beautiful but we were all tired so we just cleaned up and went to sleep having really no idea where we were. I woke up the next morning quite early and stepped outside of the cabin to one of the most amazing views I have EVER witnessed. Giant wooded mountains and valleys (the river that runs through the area is the Biyas River), towering conifers, it was breathtaking. We got to stay here for four nights, each day traveling to different cities to work.

The people of Himachal Pradesh are unlike any others I have met. They are tranquil and their tranquility is contagious. They are uniquely communal in their work and exert overflowing amounts of kindness.  We met one woman who was the Pradhan in a neighboring village. We had hiked to her home which was literally teetering on the side of the mountain, and the honor that she felt by our visited was overpowering. She seemed close to tears as we sat and chatted, sipping chai and gazing out at the ridged landscape.

Moving on, our last day at the Forest Guest House we took more of a day off, caught up on some different things and that night Himanchu was bound and determined to have a bonfire. After dinner he got it started and we all joined him around the blaze. There is this thing  that Indians have with singing…they do it ALL the time. So of course we had to sing around the bonfire. Now, I have no problem with this because I LOVE to sing, but it just so happens that right now Himanchu, Shiva and Diksha are all OBSESSED with the song Rockstar by Nickelback. So we sang Rockstar… while dancing in a circle…around a bonfire…. on top of a mountain in the Himalayas. I haven’t mentioned yet Vickas and Subhash. They were the final members of our team, both Ph. D students at Rohtak University where Kavita works. Subhash is adorably sweet though he doesn’t speak much English and Vickas… well Vickas is Vickas. He is brilliant, and I have to admit, quite fun to torment. At first he comes off as kind of an Eeyore, but later I realized he was more lighthearted like the rest of the group. So after Rockstar we played a game where we went around and each person had to sing a song, when they stopped, the next person had to start a new song that started with the phonetic sound the last song left off on. Of course all of the songs were in Hindi, but we did our best to play along anyway. :P

This blog is getting unbearably long so I will quickly sum up the rest of the trip, even though it will mean leaving out our day trip to Manali (snow capped mountains, lots of drugs, hippi capital of the world). From Kullu we headed south for the first time on the trip, to Mandi. In Mandi we stayed at another guest house behind which there were apparently five wild tigers that come our regularly and prey on domestic (not stray) dogs. From Mandi we went to Bilaspur stayed two nights and and from Bilaspur we went to Yamuna Nagar. Whew. There is so much more…food, music, Hindi, people. For the details you’ll just have to hit me up when I get back to the states.

Taj Mahal

Yesterday, after spending several days researching at the library and several nights exploring Delhi, we woke up early (6am) and boarded a bus for Agra to see the Taj Mahal.  Our tour guide (who we nicknamed Bloomy after the T-shirt he wore which read Pacific Bloom) was absolutely fantastic.  He had an incredible amount of enthusiasm, (we later found out that he had been a part of a traveling theatre troop that had performed in the states and Canada).  The trip was estimated four hours to Agra, but ours ended up around six because one of the tourists got extremely sick (food poisoning) and we had to stop several times to let him off.

The changing landscape as we left the Delhi metropolis and journeyed south towards the ancient city was fascinating to observe.  We passed through several smaller cities, whose streets were lined with small businesses selling fruits, food, tobacco and handicrafts.  The bus had to swerve several times to miss cows or buffalo crossing the road aimlessly.  Dogs, monkeys, birds, camels, donkeys, horses, cows and buffalo all casually made up the setting.  Outside of cities were large fields and some wooded areas.  Brick walls enclosed many fields, though nothing (agriculture, buildings, etc.) lay within them.  If there is one thing I can say for sure about India, be it broad, it is that people sit, stand, walk, sleep, shit, live, eat, argue, and operate EVERYWHERE.  There are so many people, and the people make up the infrastructure and the economy. This maybe seems obvious, but I think previous to being here, I thought that it was necessary for proper buildings, TOILETS!, businesses, schools – the walls in which we operate- to exist in order for people to operate; aparently this is not so. 110 degree heat, crumbling infrastructure, no infrastructure, nothing stops people from carrying out their everyday lives, in whatever means they can, making relationships, creating their own social infrastructure.

Finally arriving at the Taj around 1pm, we walked down a street lined with children aggressively pleading with all of us (our group was about 20) us to enter their shops and spend 100 rupees, 50 rupees, on trinkets, t-shirts and souvenirs. “My name is Amar. Come back later, come to my shop, come back, 100 rupees, good price, 100 rupees.” I have to say, it must have been the fact that my mother never gave in to repetitive pestering when I was growing up, that I have been instilled with the ability to remain completely unresponsive to the tactic. Reflecting on it, however, makes me feel as if I lack compassion, and that as an American I will never be able to truly know just how extreme poverty can be and what extreme poverty means. At the same time, my mind counteracts this self-deprecating ideal with the notion that poverty, inequality and development - this is what I study and this is where my passion lies. I have come here because I believe that empowering women in impoverished and underdeveloped regions sustainably develops a family and therefore a community.  I believe that when implemented effectively, reservation can empower women. I am still unsure, but on to the Taj.

 I can’t really describe it honestly, that’s why I’ve included pictures. Those can’t really describe it either though.  Two million people, working for over two decades, over one man’s obsession.  It is really haunting to be quite honest. Inside the main structure, underneath the main dome where the two graves are located, it is very dark. We circled the burials in a sea of other tourists and though I remained quiet, I could hear the murmurs of others being released and entangled in a mass web of echoes, infinitely reverberating within dome. Something made me feel like any noise I made would be trapped inside fore eternity. I don’t know what this means, it is completely illogical, but that is really exactly how I felt. Exiting the main structure, Dot, Katie and I were constantly being asked to be in pictures with strangers. My theory is that it is Dot’s blonde hair, but realistically, we all look quite different from everyone else and are therefore a novelty, I guess. At first it was kind of flattering, but it got to be quite annoying as we started to lag behind the rest of our group.

From the Taj, we went to a nice restaurant for lunch where we mingled with the other tourists on the trip. One couple had graduated recently from San Diego State and was traveling the world before heading to Indiana University for their MBAs. Another man, James from Birmingham, had finished his undergrad in media and cultural studies and was traveling solo. Another couple, Sophie and Jamal, was quite lovely. Sophie was Swiss and Jamal was Indian. They were most certainly completely adorable.  From lunch we headed to Agra Fort, a fort that was once India’s center for military operations. It was huge, beautiful and at this point the girls and I were quite ridiculous. I don’t know if the heat was just getting to us or what but the majority of utterances at Agra Fort were giggles.  We did have the chance to see a mosque, made entirely of marble inside Agra Fort.

The trip back we chatted, and tried to sleep, pulling back into Delhi around eleven. We were anticipating being dropped off at the Delhi Tourism office from which we had departed, but before we reached it the bus stopped and the guide told us we would have to just get off and hail an auto to take us where we needed to go. This was slightly distressing because we were already over an hour late, and Ravi, Pareena’s driver was supposed to pick us up at the office, additionally, we had absolutely no clue where in Delhi we were being dropped off. By some stroke of luck, Ravi – in his infinitely driver capabilities- had tracked down the bus, and we spotted him in the crux of our dilemma. In the Ford Fiesta we were carted back to Nana and Nani-where Nani was of course waiting up for us- and we collapsed, in dire need of rest.

Dwarka, Bindis, Roti and Hindi

Saturday morning we woke up to chai, prepared by, Maya, Pareena's parents' live-in maid. Nana and Nani (Pareena's parents) pay for all of her living expenses and I believe a tutor. They send her wages back to her parents in Nepal.  Saturday morning, after tea, we were offered a full body massage by a cleaning woman who comes to Nana and Nani's flat every morning. Her name is Suman (a name a procured myself after asking in Hindi!!).  Let me just say that Suman gave a gift to every man that I will ever be involved with for the rest of my life. I am certain that no massage will ever measure up to the one Suman gave me.

A bit about where I am currently stationed. Nana and Nani (the parents of my professor Pareena Lawrence who I have worked for for the past year) live it a colony of New Delhi called Dwarka. Dwarka is one of the largest sub-cities in Asia with 1,000,000 people inhabiting 5,648 ha. Nana and Nani are in Sector 22 which is a collation of apartment complexes that surround a common courtyard. Within the complex are services that range from a dry cleaners to a common kitchen that prepares and delivers meals to pedicure and manicure services (which Pareena, the girls and I are planning on employing today).

The reason that I am writing right now, 4:30am, is because of a lovely little thing called jet lag. Since I arrived I haven't slept for longer than 5 hour periods.  Strangely enough I am never really tired, but it makes for quite a bit of free time in the middle of the night.

So what have been the highlights so far? The food for sure, and the language. We have learned to ask for tea (completely critical) ask names, ask how others are doing, thank others. It's really terrific. Ravi, Nana and Nani's driver, loves giving us lessons in Hindi. Most people speak it almost exclusively and will only speak English when they are speaking to us.

The food has also been completely terrific. It is all new: roti, samosa, allagobi, lentil, curd, rice. It is all so good, so flavorful and so different. Saturday night we visited Kavita, a professor from Rohtak University in Haryana at the Haryana Bhawen (government housing in for Haryana politicians, etc. in Delhi were I will be staying later in the summer) and we met her daughter Shiva who plans to attend UMM next year!! Shiva thought it would be funny to encourage us each to eat a chili. I took the most minute bite and my mouth immediately became completely ablaze. Needless to say Shiva (named after the Hindu god of destruction) was utterly all too entertained. 

Last night we went out to a marketplace to do some 'window shopping.' Wearing our salwar kamis (tunic and cotton pants outfits that the girls and I have adored wearing since our arrival), Pareena also hooked us up with our first bindis. For those who are not familiar, bindis are the jewels or dots worn in between the eyebrows that are thought to bring luck to the wearer. I think I looked more than a little ridiculous.

In sum, as this post is getting exceedingly long, thus far everything has been indescribably wonderful. My body feels rejuvenated and healthy, absolutely delighting in every new sensation; my mind is being set on fire with curiosity, and ideas. My thirst for real experiences in development, politics and economics is being quenched; and my spirit is electrified. The girls I am with, Dot and Katie, are incredible. The atmosphere, the swelling conscienceless, the cinematography of this experience is epically illuminating. 

India Speaks

Driving home from the airport, 10:30 pm Delhi time, weaving through cyclists, scooters, buses busting with bodies in my professor's parents' little ford compact, amid all of the smells and sounds and lights I saw a construction sign, many signs actually, and they all read 'Work In Progress.' Now maybe because I had just spent 22 hours flying around the globe and potentially because I had only slept a minute handful of those hours, but for whatever reason, those words resonated with me, and I repeated them over and over in my head. Work in progress, work in Progress, work in progress. I have come to do work in progress in progressing an idea. India, the country, the people, are a work in progress; working towards development, towards equality. As I travel throughout this country I am going to keep these three words in mind. When I see slums, and filth, children begging, women accepting a life subordinate to men - work in progress. When I see anger and confusion - work in progress. When I see education, cleanliness, success, empowerment, development - work in progress.