A visit from a rug vendor

The other day, I came home from the Knowledge Center to make lunch. I hadn't gotten much farther into preparations beyond chopping vegetables when I heard someone calling, “Didi! Didi!” (Didi means 'older sister' and is used as a general term for young women around my age.) I saw a man half way up the stairs to my balcony. I asked him what was the matter and he responded with a long string of Hindi that I couldn't understand. Finally, after much confusion, he said in English, “You are very beautiful.” Laughing, I thanked him and returned to my kitchen.

A minute later, I heard him call again, “Didi, didi!” This time, he had a huge tapestry rug rolled up over his shoulder. “Very beautiful rug for your room,” he pitched it to me. I have no need of such a rug, nor do I even have space for one the size he had. I was eventually able to convince him of this in broken Hindi and he left me to finish cooking my lunch.

I had a visit from a door-to-door salesman. He must have seen me buying vegetables on the road and suspected that since I was foreign, I was rich. I'm sure it didn't take much asking from my neighbors to figure out exactly where I lived.

I am about to take off on a nearly three week trip around India with Anya, two of her friends, and her sister. Our travel plans include Delhi, Aghra, Jalgoan, Pune, Chennai, and Madurai. I am looking forward to a break and a chance to see more of India. I don't anticipate being able to update this blog while I am traveling, but I promise to bring back lots of interesting stories.

Another Wedding

Last night, after finishing a late meeting about the web site up at TARA Center, where Jagori Grameen's office is, I discovered that it was already getting dark. Anya had told me many times that it wasn't a good idea to walk home alone after dark down that stretch of road, so I turned on the flashlight feature of my cellphone and hurried down the hill. Not far down, to my surprise, Devika and Gaytri greeted me coming back up the road. (Gaytri is on our agricultural team.) Gaytri's cousin was getting married that night, so she invited me to join her and Devika at the wedding feast.

It wasn't far at all from TARA Center. There must have been several hundred people packed into the courtyards of the housing complex. At the center of it all were the bride and groom. I have only ever been to the second day of a wedding, and then the couple have been out of sight, so this was something new to me. We watched the ceremony progress while waiting for our turn at the dham, the feast.

The couple sat underneath a small sort of tent pavilion made of painted wooden poles and decorated with tinsel, lights, wooden parrots. The bride was dressed in a fancy red and gold saalwar kameez, and her dupata was over her head and face the whole time like a veil. Her husband wore a pink turban, decked out with tinsel, and a paper vest sort of thing over the front of his shirt with even more colorful tinsel.

To my understanding, Indian's love tinsel. It's all over their Hindu shrines as well.

During the portion of the ceremony we watched, there was a sort of puja, worship. The girl's parents held a large conch shell over her head and prayed to the god Shiva while chant singing. All the while, she and her new husband knelt under the tent pavilion.

While we waited for the feast, I wound up sitting among a group of local girls, who struck up a conversation with me in English. Seeing it as a good chance to practice my Hindi, I stubbornly stayed out of my native language. The girls, however, seemed to think I know more Hindi than I do, but on the whole, it was fun to talk and practice with them.

The feast was an excellent one, with some of the best dham food I have had since being here. I'm certainly getting better at eating with my fingers, as I was able to keep up with all of the new courses. After the meal, Gaytri took us into the house to see the bride where she sat surrounded by some women friends or family. She was very pretty but very young.

After having eaten our fill, we all headed home. Devika and I were both glad to have someone to walk home with after dark.

Devika told me that the wedding feast differs greatly around the country. In Delhi, it is usually held in hotels or reception halls on long tables with real plates, rather than on the ground with leaf plates and people serving out of baskets. The food is also very regional, so what I eat up here wouldn't be eaten in Delhi or elsewhere.

Wedding season, in this region, has been going since October but it is now coming to an end. I am told that the weddings going on now are the last, and there won't be any more until this June. I believe that the times of year are designated as auspicious through some kind of astrology. This time of year, you can hardly walk down the road without spotting a tent archway or three that signifies a wedding or hearing the blaring music of a wedding band.

It certainly is exciting, but with wedding season over, things will get much quieter. As an added bonus, all of my coworkers are more likely to be around more regularly and not at some friend or relative's wedding. Things will slowly go back to normal.

Birthday Feast

Devika's birthday was this week and her parents came up from Delhi to surprise her. They were staying with a friend of theirs that her mother had met at a writing workshop about half an hour from Rakkar.

On the evening of her birthday, we all hopped into her parents' car and drove to the house where they were staying. It was a beautiful place even more out of the way than where we live. They greeted us around a little bonfire where one of the cooks of the house roasted chicken, vegetables, and paneer on kabobs over the open flame. I haven't had meat like that in a long time. It was really wonderful. In the mean time, I snuggled with their 1-month-old puppy. I do miss having clean healthy dogs around that you can pet without fear.

I did discover, however, that when people make lemonade around here, they like to put lots of salt into it. Next time I'll ask for no salt. After we feasted on the kebobs, we were surprised by a soup brought out to us. Then the told us that that was all merely the appetizer. We were invited inside for the real dinner.

There was more food than we could all eat together and it was all wonderful. I know I'm not the only one who stuffed herself just because the food was too good to stop eating. And then, of course, there was cake. Indian cake tends to be drier than American cake, with thick, sweet icing that almost seems like whipped cream. Different but delicious.

It was wonderful to be able to meet Devika's parents. They have extended an invitation to us to visit them when we are down in Delhi any time.

Eating

I was recently asked, “Do you get to eat Indian food all the time?” The answer to that is that I do as long as I learn to cook it myself. The truth of the situation is that there are essentially no restaurants in Rakkar and Sidhbari. Those that there are only serve chow mein and momos, the Tibetan name for Chinese dumplings. (A side note- fans of “Avatar: The Last Air Bender,” I would bet that those dumplings are where the name for the lemur came from.) The Knowledge Center is only a minute down the road from my house, so I have the luxury of eating at home for all of my meals if I am around.

For the first two or three months, there was really one dish that I knew how to make, and I made it several times a week with different variations. This is called subji (literally meaning vegetables). Around here, it is usually eating with a plain flour and water flat bread called roti. I usually have it with basmati rice instead. A few miserably failed attempts at roti early on discouraged me. As I am gaining more culinary bravery, I think I might try again, perhaps with supervision.

To give you an idea of what I have been eating, and to give you a chance to eat like I do, here's how I made subji. This recipe is based on what Anya taught me early on and my own experimentation. This serves two. You can do this with really any kind of vegetable. I use whatever is in season at the local stand. You can do just one vegetable or combine different types together. For my portions, a small to medium head of cauliflower or cabbage, two medium eggplants, or the equivalent is a good amount. I have done this with green beans, peas, squash, potatoes, carrots, and other vegetables as well. All measurements are approximate as I just use plain kitchen spoons to measure.

Basic Subji:
1 small tomato, diced
1 small onion, diced
2-3 cloves of garlic, minced
3 cardiumum seeds
1 tbs. cumin seeds*
1 tsp. garm masala**
1 tsp. salt
a pinch of red chili powder to taste
½ tsp. Turmeric
vegetable(s) of choice

1.The basic idea of Indian cooking is to start with spices in the oil before adding other ingredients. As such, put some oil (I use soy oil or mustard oil) in a wok and swirl to coat the sides. Once it is heated, add the cumin seeds and cardiumum seeds until they begin to crackle.
2.Then add the onion and garlic and fry until it begins to turn brown. Add the tomato and fry until the mixture begins to become a paste.
3.Add the remaining spices and stir them in. Add the vegetables with about a cup of water. Stir them around until coated. Reduce heat, cover, and let simmer until the vegetables are soft. Remove the lid and let the remaining water boil off. Serve hot with rice or roti.

* If you only have cumin powder, add this with the spices later on.
** garm masala is a common spice blend found in Northern India. You might be able to find this in the Asian food section of your grocery store or at an Asian market. Otherwise, you could duplicate this by combining the spices yourself.

Another staple of the north Indian diet is daal, lentils. At first, I didn't like daal very much, but when Kelly visited us in November, she introduced me to the secret ingredient she had discovered: soy sauce. I can't pretend that this is authentic daal, but it's how I like to make it.

A pressure cooker is a staple cooking tool here for everything from potatoes to rice to beans. Lentils are no exception. There are ways to make lentils without a pressure cooker, but it will take much longer. There are many types of lentils. I use the smallest yellow kind. As a rule, the smaller the grain, the shorter cooking time it takes. Without a pressure cooker, soak the lentils for two hours or so, then boil for a long time, covered, until they're tender. This again, serves two.

Daal:
½ cup lentils
1 small tomato, diced
½ small onion, diced
3-5 cloves of garlic, minced
1 tbs. mustard seeds
½ tsp. turmeric
2 tbs. Salt
1 tsp. garm masala
½ cup soy sauce (I've never measured it, this is just a guess at how much I pour in. It may be more.)
(Optional: some small vegetables like chopped green beans, corn, peas, or Japanese eggplant)

1.Cook the lentils. Put in a pressure cooker with 1 cup of water. For tiny daal, eight whistles should be enough. For average and larger daal, you will need between twelve and fourteen whistles.
2.In a wok, heat oil (soy oil works very well) and add mustard seeds, frying until they crackle. Add the garlic and onions until they begin to turn pink, then add the tomatoes and other vegetables, if any. Add the spices and mix thoroughly.
3.Add the lentils with 1 ½ cups of water. Mix it in with the other ingredients, then add the soy sauce. Reduce heat and cover for a few minutes until vegetables are tender. Uncover and boil off the remaining water. Serve with rice or roti.

As I mentioned, I have recently become more culinarily adventurous, but these two dishes still remain staples for me.

Last night, I wound up in McLeod Ganj for dinner with Anya. As we were both craving miso soup, we headed to my personal favorite restaurant, Lung Ta, the Japanese restaurant. The food is entirely vegetarian and very authentic, plus their service is very fast. As we settled into one of the corner tables where you sit on the floor on cushions Japanese style, we started to notice that we understood the language that the group of tourists was speaking next to us: Japanese.

We half-eavesdropped for most of the meal, both lamenting how our Japanese has gotten weaker since coming here and colored with Hindi words. By the end of the meal we worked up our courage and said hello to the tourists. We had a brief conversation in Japanese with them, and I only slipped into Hindi a couple of times. My Japanese came back pretty quickly, but for Anya who hasn't used it for nearly a year, she had a harder time. It was fun to practice as well as remind myself that I'm not a language dunce. It is frustrating after being good at a language to start over completely. Admittedly, I don't understand much Hindi in conversation around here, but I get by.

A recent discovery of mine, thanks to the shopping genius of Sonia, is the Monday Market in Dharmsala. Most stores are closed on Monday in Dharmsala. However, lots of private used and new clothing sellers line the street with tables or tarps, piled with clothes. The shoppers become a traffic hazard as they dart across the street looking for the best deals. As I somehow managed to get to India without any sweaters, that was my mission. I picked up one for 100 rupees and another for only 50 rupees. I passed a table full of sweatpants, and picked up a pair for 50 rupees, figuring they would make good pajamas when it gets colder. For under $4, I am now much better outfitted for winter.

The sweatpants had a tag still on them from Goodwill in the USA. Just how they got from Goodwill to Dharmshala, I will never know, but they would have cost me $4.50 in the US by that tag. I think I got a good deal.

An Indian Thanksgiving

I apologize for not updating lately. Life has been busy with finishing up my English class, hanging out with Kelly (the Shansi fellow in Madurai who was up to visit for over half of the month), and not to mention participating in NaNoWriMo.

Last Thursday was Thanksgiving. That morning, some of us foreigners got talking and decided to arrange a Thanksgiving feast. With lots of confusion in between, Roni, Anya, Druve, Sonia, Brian, and I wound up going up to McLeod Ganj for dinner. Although over half of the group was vegetarian, both Brian and I thought it would hardly be Thanksgiving without some bird to eat. So, we went to the Korean restaurant and had sweet and sour chicken, among other things. It was a fantastic feast by a roaring fire in the fireplace.

After dinner, we stopped at the Japanese restaurant for lemon squares, then continued to Nick's Italian Kitchen for our pie. We wound up having cake or brownies and ice cream. Having stuffed ourselves silly, we went home satisfied.

Now that I have been here for three months, I am beginning to be a recognizable part of village life, I think. The other day, when I wasn't feeling so confident about my Hindi, I wanted to take two sets of fabric to the Royal Tailor to get new winter weight suits. I walked part way up the driveway, looked inside, and thought I didn't see the tailor, so I went on my way. I wound up doing this about two or three times over the course of the day.

The next day, I ran into the tailor by my house, asking why I hadn't come in the day before. I told him that I didn't see anyone there, but promised to stop by later that day. I did, handed over my fabric, and got my measurements taken again. They told me it would be done in about two or three weeks.

A few days later when I was walking home from Norbalinka where I had had breakfast with Devika and Roni, I ran into the tailor and his assistant going the other way. He greeted me with a respectful, “Namaskar Jenna,” and told me that because they were going somewhere in mid-December, they decided to get my suits done before the go. They gave me a new date a full ten days earlier than they originally planned. One thing that does amaze me is how well tailors keep track of dates. So, I'm looking forward to picking up my new suits on Thursday afternoon. This does mean that I need to get to work on hemming my dupata (scarves).

Another day, when I was walking back from Nishta, the school day was just finishing. Many of the children I passed practiced their, “Hello. How are you?” on me, but one little boy, who must have been eight or ten years old, tried to follow me very closely. That I walk very quickly for my height, and that he was half my size made this fact pretty obvious. He would scurry up beside me on one side of the road, fall behind, and then scurry up on my other side. Finally, I asked him his name and slowed my pace. We had a short conversation about where each other lived and what we did. It motivated me to go right home and study more Hindi.

Winter Setting In

The weather has taken a turn for the colder here as winter sets in. While everyone reassures me that I won't wake up to snow on my front porch, it is still significantly colder; cold enough to make me want to wear lots of layers and stay wrapped in my blankets in bed. Houses here don't have central heating or insulation, so your warmth is what you wear. My house has mud on the inner walls, so that helps some, but none of my windows really seal and my ceiling has no insulation at all.

Coming from Minnesota, I can deal with cold as I know how to dress for it, however, even there, heating provides some relief from the chill. I'm toying with the idea of getting a space heater for my room when it gets even colder. My landlady stopped up this morning to tell me that she's going to get me a hot water bottle to put under my covers at night to keep me even warmer. This time of year, people drink a lot of chai too (although it seems like everyone is always drinking chai no matter what time of year it is).

I was also interested to discover that, since most people prefer wearing sandals here, socks with sandals are not a fashion fau pas as they would be in the Unite States. In fact, everyone does it. That way, you can show off your lovely socks to everyone. They even make socks specially for thong sandals with the big toe separate from the rest, much like tabi socks in Japan.

One thing that continually throws me for a loop is that, although winter is setting in, there are certain things that are coming into season. At least one type of tree is blossoming right now and people are planting new crops in their fields. I’ll need to get used to plant life still existing in winter.

Now that my Hindi lessons have fallen into a rhythm, I figure now is a good time to talk about a little what they are like. Our tutor is a girl named Indu, who is in her late teens. Anya knew of her because her father is a gardener in Didipur. She is very bright and wanted to go to college but couldn't because she was needed to help at home and in the fields.

Anya and I meet with Indu twice a week. Our lessons usually consist of four parts. First, she looks at the sentences we have written for homework since the last lesson and goes over any issues we have. Next, we usually do a reading from one of our books. Since Anya and I are different levels, she uses and intermediate reader (by Usha R. Jain) and I just use the Hindi dialogue textbook from SASLI's second year Hindi class. We trade off week by week which readings we actually do in our lesson, though we both are practicing reading outside of class. Then, for listening and spelling practice, Indu goes through the reading and finds words we had trouble with, and we have a sort of spelling test. I'm slowly getting better at hearing the difference between long and short vowels and aspirate and unaspirated consonants. Finally, we have conversation practice. Sometimes Indu gives us a topic or situation and sometimes we just pick our own.

After our Hindi lesson is done, we switch over to English and tutor Indu in English. She is an eager student and probably does her homework better than all but a few of the students in my classes.

Granted, I know I could be a better Hindi student. It's easier to study daily when you have class daily, but I find my studying slipping off at the end of the day. I go to bed telling myself, I'll study more tomorrow. That's certainly something I need to work more on.

Wedding Feast

On Thursday I attended my first Indian wedding. Granted, we weren't there for the whole thing, but I got to experience a part of it. Weddings around here, to my understanding, are at least a three day process. There is an evening for the women to put henna on their hands. There is the wedding ceremony, and then the following day, there is the feast and more celebration. What we attended was the dham, the feast.

Somehow, I knew people on both sides of the marriage. The bride was the daughter of Dr. Barbara's cook and the groom was the brother of Phillip's landlord, who attended our combined birthday party and invited everyone there to the marriage. We, however, didn't get to see the bride and groom themselves.

Anya, Kelly, and I, dressed in our finest suits, trekked across several fields, managing to pick up an escort of all three Nishta dogs on our way, before we reached the wedding. When we arrived, the feast had already started, and what I saw was much like the village feast of earlier this fall. Sitting on long mats on the ground with leaf plates in front of them were wedding guests. People with baskets and bowls of food ran up and down the aisles between the plates and dumped food onto each plate as they passed.

Here, odd numbers are auspicious, so wedding feasts usually have either five or seven courses. Likewise, when we gave our offering envelope, more or less to pay for the food, we gave 151 rupees between us. Giving 150 would have been back luck.

Everyone was wearing beautiful clothing, though there were no saris even there. It was fun to look at what everyone had chosen to wear to the celebration. The father of the bride wore a bright red scarf tied in a sort of turban on his head.

There was not enough room for everyone to eat at once, so as soon as one group had eaten it's seven courses, they would throw out their leaf plates, wash their hands with whatever water was left in their cups (this is a finger food occasion), and then the next group would flood onto the area and find a seat.

While people were eating, women from the wedding party would pass out little bags of bangles to random guests. I think this is another auspicious thing to do.

After the feast, we sat in the shade for a a while, then went up to Phillip's apartment for coffee before heading back home.

a little bit of excitement

There has been quite a bit of excitement around here lately. First of all, my class has started up again. Thanks to a number of holidays and confusion around their teachers disappearing to Kashmir, I had incredibly patchy attendance from all of my students. Most of them missed taking the midterm test. Once I came back, I hoped that things would straighten themselves out, but there were still rampant absences. Thankfully, I have all of their phone numbers, so I send all of them text messages reminding them to show up to class this last Saturday. Even still, there were some people missing, but today the last of them came back again. It's a relief to know that my classes will start running normally again.

Secondly, Kelly, the Shansi fellow in Madurai, came up to visit. Anya cut out of the retreat in Kashmir a bit early and went to meet her grandparents in Calcutta. There, she also met up with Kelly. They two of them traveled around Calcutta and Varanasi before come back here on Saturday.

While the retreat in Kashmir reminded me that I was part of something bigger, not just a disconnected English teacher in the Knowledge Center. Now I am reminded of something else bigger. It's not just Anya and I here and, our fellowship isn't just about navigating the ins and outs of Jagori. I had sort of forgotten all of the other Shansi fellows around Asia and that we're not just teaching machines. It's about cultural exchange, traveling, and growing in understanding of the world as well. Anya scolded me the other day that perhaps I take my classes a bit too seriously and that I need to consider traveling sometime soon. To that end, Kelly is going back to Madurai about the time that this current class session finishes. I am toying with the idea of going back with her and seeing a bit of south India.

On top of just reminding me of my place in things, it is wonderful to have Kelly around. Although we only met during our winter term training, we've become friends. It's always nice to have a fresh face around to liven up the group.

The third bit of excitement is that, for the full moon, the Jagori Grameen website was launched today. There are still pieces that I need to fill in more, but it is online now at http://www.jagorigrameen.org.

Jagori Retreat in Kashmir

For Jagori's annual staff retreat, we all went to Shrinagar in Kashmir. Travel to the retreat in itself was a two day ordeal. On Tuesday morning, we all gathered at the Dharmsala bus stand to take a standard bus to Phratankot in the Punjab. There, we spent the evening at a Sikh temple until our coach bus arrived at 3:00 AM. I'm certain the reason we stayed there is because it was free. On the upper floor in a long hallway, they put out old, worn mattress pads and rather stained looking sheets for us to sleep on. I was among those that attempted to stay awake until the next bus came, but as more and more people dropped off, and I couldn't keep my eyes open wide enough to keep reading Les Miserables, I gave in and curled up for the last half hour.

That evening, before everyone settled in for the night, I went out to wander the town with Vandana, Vandana (there are three of them on my team), Devika, Anya, and Roni. We went on a grand adventure of people giving wrong directions to find an ATM, then followed our nose to a little restaurant for dinner. While others had puranata (a flat-bread), samosa (breaded pockets with potatoes and vegetables inside), I went for the chow mein, which I thought would be less spicy. I was wrong. Chow mein is a very common dish served at restaurants in India, and it is Indian in the same way Lee Ann Chin is American. This chow mein was loaded with green chili peppers more than any other vegetable. It was quite a surprise.

Once back at the temple for the night, I 'made friends' with a group of children from a Sikh family that had traveled to visit the temple and was staying the night there as well. The youngest of them, a 10-year-old boy, was shyly dragged by his older brother and sister, to where Vandana and I were sitting and told us that he wanted to become my friend. The reason for his interest was pretty obvious: my complexion and hair color. I am obviously foreign and that makes me instantly an object of interest.

At first, I practiced my Hindi on him and his siblings, with Vandana's help, then she suggested that they practice their English on me. At first, they wanted to know the basics, like my name, where I was from, my age, my family. Then, they moved into more unusual, and amusing, questions.

“You are so fair! What do you do to your face to get so fair?”
“You hair color? How do you get it that color?” The boy reached over to pet the hair on top of my head then added, “It's so silky. How do you get it so silky?”
“Why are your eyes that color? What color are they anyway?” Mine are a very light shade of blue. At this point I was getting frazzled trying to come up with even remotely satisfactory answers for them. Vandana cut in with, “Because that way they will match her outfit so well.” I was wearing sky blue that night. That seemed to dissuade them.
“Why do you wear glasses?”

It continued on until we excused ourselves and went back up to where everyone was settling in. Since our space didn't have any doors at all, we saw them later that evening when they let it slip that they wanted to 'make friends' with Anya as well and hung out with us for some time later.

At 2:30 AM, the whole Jagori team was roused and packed everything up again to load up on our coach bus. My strategy of staying up late to force myself to sleep on the bus seems to have failed, as the bus had awful shocks and the roads were incredibly winding. At best, I slept 2 hours in total. We stopped sometime after dawn for breakfast at a road-side restaurant for chai, beans, and puri (fried flat-bread). When much of the team complained that the food was bad, we all loaded back on the bus and went a few miles down the road to another restaurant and ate there. For the first people served like Anya and I, we had our second breakfast there. It was much the same food, but apparently better. I can't tell bad beans from good ones yet.

We didn't really stop for lunch, but had a quick snack of more chai and pakora (battered fried vegetables), which I didn't partake in because I was feeling queasy. We then loaded back on the bus and headed off again. Before the bus could leave, one vendor saw that I was foreign through my open window and tried to convince me to stay with his cousin, for free, once I reached Shrinagar. I declined as politely as I could and then the bus drove off, saving me from farther argument. We arrived at our hostel in Shrinagar at around 7:00 PM. That made for about 14 hours on the road that day. We had chai and snacks then dinner before all falling into our beds. By beds, I mean pads on the floor lined up six in a room. It's comfortable and cozy, if cold. I was glad for the closeness of everyone and slept in silk thermal underwear, pajamas, socks, and a sweater. I could comfortably had worn more, even.

On Thursday, the retreat workshops began. The morning was spent giving presentations of what each Jagori team had been doing lately and goals for the next five years. In the afternoon we broke into our teams and discussed the strengths of our individual activities and how to monitor them better then gathered together to give suggestions and feedback to each group on their works.

That night after dinner, we invited the engineering students of the hostel to have a cultural exchange with us. This is a men's hostel, so all of them were men. It turned into a dance party, more than anything. Four Kashmiri boys tried to perform a pop dance for us, but kept forgetting their moves. From there, the Jagori girls sang songs while they danced. Eventually a few of the Jagori men joined in dancing, followed by some women. At one point, they pulled up Anya to dance with them, then Roni later. As I sat farther away from them, I was safer from that kind of attention, but I knew it was only a matter of time until I would be forced to dance as well. It took them until the last dance, but they did grab me. While Jagori has gotten me more comfortable with singing on command, I'm still incredibly nervous dancing in front of people. I danced for a minute or so, then snuck off and sat down again. It was more fun for me just to watch.

On Friday, we toured around Shrinagar. First, we went up into a famous hill station up in the mountains where we briefly wandered, took pictures, and did a bit of shopping. Anya bargained hard for a shawl, while I managed to get material for a wool salwar kameez at a cheaper price than her shawl without even bargaining. I guess because shawls were in higher demand, he felt like he could raise the price, where as fabric wasn't as much.

After that, we got back in the bus and drove to the mountains on the other side of Shrinagar. There, we visited two Mughal era gardens and their temples. What surprised me most about the gardens was that most of the flowers were types that I see frequently back at home in Minnesota, suggesting that the climate here is very similar to that back home.

Kashmir, despite the mountains, reminds me a lot of home in a way. Something about the trees turning yellow, the crisp cool air, and something else I can't put my finger on all adds to the feeling of me being close to home.

After the gardens, we went to Lake Dal and hired small boats to take us around the lake. They had canopies and soft seats enough for four passengers. It was incredibly relaxing to be rowed across the still water. The peace was broken, however, by a floating marketplace. The lake was filled with vendors in their own boats selling everything from saffron to jewelry to tea to shawls. Unlike those on the side of the road, you couldn't run away from these. You had to convince them firmly that you really, really had no intention of buying what they had.

Our guide took us past a lotus patch. The flowers weren't in season, but it was still pretty stunning with all the huge leaves peaking up over the water. Then he offered to take us to a woodworking workshop and we accepted. When we pushed up to shore, a man was chiseling intricate flower and vine designs into a plank of chestnut wood. It appeared to be a cabinet door. He told us about the process and then took us up into the show room. It was almost like a museum, the craftsmanship on all of his pieces were so beautiful. I walked out with a few more inexpensive souvenirs to give as gifts. I know enough about woodworking myself to know that this man was a true artist with wood.

Hopping back into our boat, we floated slowly back across the lake, watching the sun set. It was really magical. We all wished that time would slow to a stop just so we could keep enjoying the beautiful view and gentle sway of the water.

From there, we went on a quick shopping trip in Shrinagar. There, I finally found myself a shawl I liked in nice teal and blue colors. We also happened across an English book store, where I picked up one of the Tolkien histories. We had little time left, so we hurried back to the bus and home for the night. Dinner came around 9:00. I thought that people in Himachal eat late, but it seems that the schedule is even later here in Kashmir.

At nearly all of our stops, a common tourist trap was a photography group that would dress up people in traditional Kashmiri clothes, have them pose with a gaudy basket of fake flowers, and take their picture. There was even a vendor boat or two out on Dal Lake taking pictures like this. While our little boat managed to escape them, nearly all the other Jagori women came home with photos of them dressed as Kashmiris.

On Saturday, we had more meetings all day. It was the most productive time for us and we got a lot done, including starting to restructure the responsibilities in our team. While some of the earlier sessions had left me with a sour taste in my mouth, I really feel like we made good progress and everyone understood each other. We finished off the night with some singing and dancing, as always.

An interesting point of note: in India, nuts are called 'dried fruit.' As we left the session tonight we were asked if we wanted some dried fruits. I happily responded that I'd love some dried mango, but was told that they only had almonds and walnuts. I wound up buying a bag of each anyway from the college cafeteria below where we had our sessions.

Kashmiri cuisine is very oily and consists of more beans and rice than Himchali cuisine does. What doesn't have oil usually has lots of ghee (purified butter). This has led to some stomach troubles for me, but I've learned what I can eat safely and what I can't. Thanks to my cousin Krista's training this summer of putting chili powder into absolutely everything we ate this summer, I no longer get an upset stomach whenever I eat spicy food, but oil and dairy still cause problems for me. My friends and I just laugh about my overly sensitive stomach. What else can you do when nature gives you troubles?

The trip back was mostly uneventful, but somehow longer. We must have taken a different route, making two middle-of-the-night bus changes. We left the hostel at about 9:30 AM on Sunday morning and arrived back in Rakkar at 5:45 AM on Monday morning, just in time to greet our landlady and hear the early morning worship music from the temple near by.

We took a few stops, but mostly pushed on to get back as soon as possible. I think everyone was secretly thinking of bathing with hot water, something we hadn't been able to do all week. On our way out of the valley where Shrinagar was, we got stopped at a check point. Unlike on our way in, but Roni and I were in the front of the bus. Roni was right in front of the door and the official noticed her right off, demanding a passport and having her fill out a form. Somehow, he didn't see me right across the aisle. The girls around me realized what was going on, and told me to quickly cover my head and face with my dupata and pretend to be sleep. They didn't want to have to take the extra time to have me fill out the paperwork too. Hiding like that, with the girls all giggling around me, I passed for an Indian.

We took a shopping stop once we were out of the valley, but in the market we stopped at, the shops were all mostly identical: baskets, dried fruit, ugly shawls, and souvenir cricket bats. It make all of us wish we had more time to shop in Shrinagar itself.

While there were ups and downs this last week, I'm glad I went. I got a much better feeling for what Jagori is about and how it works. Almost more importantly, I got to know the other Jagori staff that don't pass through the Knowledge Center. It took a while to break the ice because most of the staff assumed I spoke almost no Hindi. I have been shy of them because I was worried about not being able to hold a conversation. Vandana told me that had the effect of making them shy away from me, afraid that I didn't want to talk to them. I stubbornly worked on my Hindi all week and soon most of the staff realized that they could talk to me. Another side effect is that my Hindi improved greatly over the course of the retreat. It was the beginning of a lot of new friendsh

Deepawali Lights

This Saturday was Deepawali, the festival for Lakshmi, the goddess of wealth. Because of the holiday, I gave my students the day off and joined the celebrations myself. Deepawali is, above all, a beautiful holiday. Someone first explained it to me as the “Indian Christmas.”

The religious aspect of it is to welcome Lakshmi into your house. To do this, people light candles and little oil lamps and set them up all around their house. They drape garlands of marigolds over doors and windows and colorful Christmas lights wherever they can. In front of their doors, they draw or paint intricate designs to give a path for Lakshmi to the door, lining it with more candles.

For the more secular part, people blow off fire crackers, give gifts, and celebrate in all sorts of other ways.

As for me, I went with my friends to Sonia and Bryan's house where they were throwing a big party. After being introduced to the other guests, Sonia performed her puja (worship) for Lakshmi, which several of the guests took part in as well. After that was over, we were each handed a box of candles to decorate their patio and yard with. When all of the candles were lit—there must have been close to a hundred of them—it looked almost magical. Once that was done Bryan and Sonia brought out their fireworks. Unlike most locals who prefer firecrackers that mostly just make an earsplitting bang, Sonia had brought back real fireworks and fountains from the Punjab where she is from. It was pretty exciting and colorful, but one of the guest's three-year-old daughter was having some trouble coping with all the noise. Both she and Bryan and Sonia's equally harried dog took shelter inside on the sofa.

After most of the fireworks were done, we all migrated inside for a huge Punjabi dinner. The food was all fantastic and more than we all could eat. When dinner was wrapping up, I was asked to sing once again. This time, I suspected something like that would happen, so I came prepared with “Sure on this Shining Night.” It seemed appropriate. While it is still a little unnerving to be asked to sing on the spot, I'm gaining confidence with it, and even enjoying it. I will take my options to sing when I can. It's one thing to be 'that college student who can sing pretty well' hanging out around the Oberlin Conservatory, and entirely another to be 'the only girl in the village who can sing Western classical music.' It's somewhat liberating. I have a lot more fun singing when I don't have to worry about the critical ears of my listeners.

Unrelated but almost as exciting, I think I saw the Dali Lama by being in the right place at the right time this last Tuesday. I was on a bus coming back from Dharmsala when we encountered a huge traffic jam at the fork in the road where one leads back to Sidhbari and the other to Gagal. There were police officers everywhere, directing traffic off of the Gagal fork. Traffic was packed so tightly on the Sidhbari fork that it had completely come to a stop. My bus was more or less caught in the middle of the intersection, so I could see everything that went by.

Suddenly, one police car came up the Gagal fork by with sirens blaring, followed by a second. Behind them was a black jeep with a man in the front who was waving. My bus erupted into murmurs that made me wonder who it was I had just seen. Following the black car were two vans and a whole bush load of military police. After they passed, traffic slowly returned to normal and I eventually got home.

It wasn't until several days later when I related this incident to Anya and I found out who it was. Evidently, many people had gone to Dharmsala and waited on the road side just to catch a glimpse of him on his way up to McLeod Ganj. Here I just got lucky on my way back from a shopping trip. I'm hoping that sometime before I leave I will be able to hear him speak, rather than just a glimpse of him waving from a car.

Birthday Parties

First off, I want to thank everyone for the birthday well-wishes. I did have a fun weekend.

While the party the evening of my actual birthday wasn't exactly my kind of party there was lots of good food and singing. Because I had to teach that day, I chose to wear my nicest salwar kameez suit as a private celebration.

Didi's party the next day, however, was a blast. It ran from 11:30 a.m. until at least 5:30 that night. In a corner of Didipur, they had set up a large tent filled with tables and chairs. In the end, there were more people there than chairs. I would believe that she had almost the estimated 100 people there. The highlights of the day were the food and performances. There was a large buffet filled with all of Didi's favorite dishes. I have to say, Didi has good taste in food. I think my favorite there was a paneer (Indian cottage cheese) and peas dish that puffed lotus seeds in it. I've never had lotus seeds before, and apparently they're reserved for special occasions only.

Even more spectacular was the double-tiered chocolate cake so large that it had to be carried in on its own table. It was decorated with chocolate flowers and sculptures of ducks and geese. It was really the most amazing cake I have ever seen and one of the best I have ever eaten. Along with the cake, was vanilla and butterscotch ice cream, which was a very nice treat. Since most people don't even have refrigerators, you don't get ice cream very awesome. When I heard this cake and ice cream was coming, I started to wonder just how it could be served to 100 people in an environmentally friendly way. The answer was leaf bowls. Like the leaf plates I ate on at the village feast, these were made of large fresh leaves stitched together with what looked like tiny toothpicks. I really think the rest of the world could take a lesson from leaf dishes. It's much more sustainable than paper plates or Styrofoam ones.

As to entertainment, a couple of songs were sung for Didi. One of the other guests was a Tibetan woman from McLeod Ganj who was a very talented singer. Just before she started to sing, Anya asked me if I could sing something for Didi as well, so I had just a few minutes to pull something together, which I was glad to do. If it was ever a secret to begin with, the fact that I am a decent Western classical singer is very public knowledge now. And here I was worried about having opportunities to sing here. I need to practice a bit more though so I don't keep singing the same two songs every time anyone asks me.

After the singing, there was a short clown show. Dr. Barbara has some friends from Germany in an avocational clown troupe that she invited to come and do a tour of performances in the area. As it happened, their tour just began, so they were invited to come perform at Didi's party as well. It really made for an exciting event.

The party was also a great place to meet interesting people. I got to talk to Sister Celia about what it's like being a Catholic missionary in a heavily Hindu area and what brought her here. I met a few clients of Didi's who just moved back from living in Bloomington, Minnesota (where my dad grew up). They had been electrical engineers trained at Iowa State University in Ames, Iowa (where my mom grew up). We had a great time exchanging nostalgia for Minnesota. Right now, Didi is building a house for them and they invited me to come visit them once their house is done. It's funny how one can find a little piece of home no matter where you go in the world.

Reason to Party

Life has been pretty quiet lately, but this weekend is sure to get exciting, namely because of birthdays. Didi's 80th birthday is tomorrow. Phillip, the Austrian volunteer at Nishta, is also turning 20 tomorrow. Add me to the mix, turning 23 today, and Anya's grandma whose birthday was on Wednesday, and there's plenty of reason to party.

Didi is throwing a huge party tomorrow with as many as 100 guests expected. She has, however, thrown all the rest of us with birthdays around now on the bill of guests of honor. Druv, another one of Anya's neighbors, planned to throw a young people birthday party tonight for Phillip. Upon finding out that he was throwing a party for Phillip on my birthday, it became my birthday party too. Wanting to do something special myself, I invited some friends to join me for dinner at a delicious little Japanese restaurant up in McLeod Ganj last night. It wasn't much of a party, in a sense, but it was still a lovely evening.

Stepping backwards, since I teach today but had yesterday off, I decided to get all my lesson planning done the day before and give myself a fun day. First, I went up to Dharmsala with Roni to go fabric shopping. It was super fun to go from shop to shop and see what each had in stock. After about an hour of this, I came out with makings for two new suits and five meters of an ugly yet cheap fabric to make a mock-up of a costume I am planning. (Finally getting some thread, I turned the hem of the dupata that the tailor had surged in white. I forgot just how calming hand sewing is for me and I look forward to having a project to work on.)

I had never been fabric shopping myself before, so it was a fun adventure. The first suit makings I got were already in a set. It's sage green and sort of straw color. Very pretty. The second suit was at a store that had some by-the-meter fabric. I found a very nice sky blue with gold swirls on it to make a cameez (tunic shirt) and a matching sheer fabric that faded form that blue to purple and fuchsia for the dupata (scarf). The salwar (pants) fabric that went with it had rather ugly flowers on it, so I decided to play mix-and-match. I found a really nice light lavender fabric that I liked, but there wasn't enough on the bolt to make a pair of salwar. The shopkeeper then tried to convince me to pick all sorts of pink and blue fabrics instead, but none of them really fit with what I wanted. After arguing with him for quite some time, he finally left the shop and shortly returned with a full bolt of the same lavender. “From my other shop,” he explained. Why didn't he do that to begin with?

After that, I went up to McLeod Ganj to meet Anya's grandparents. They just arrived up here on Thursday night, and, since Anya had to teach yesterday, she suggested that I go hang out with them for the afternoon. They really are wonderful people, over eighty years old and in fantastic shape from doing daily yoga and long walks. Her grandma almost out-walked me. Her grandpa is Indian from Mumbai, a retired engineer, and her grandma is a retired art historian. Between the two of them, I got great explanations of the temples that we visited, historically, artistically, and religiously.

We had lunch at a little coffee shop while we hunted through their travel guide for something to do. We eventually settled on a nice walk to the next town over, Bhagsu. It was about 4km round trip and very pretty. We wound up at a Shiva temple that was partly under construction, but it did have a swimming pool (for ritual washing, I assume). There was also a waterfall on the mountainside beyond the temple. We didn't walk all the way up to it, but we did get a pretty good look from the exit of the temple. Upon returning to McLeod Ganj, we bought some postcards and sat at another coffee shop, drinking lassis and writing postcards until Anya arrived after work.

Once Anya got there, we ran into Phillip at a book store and headed to the Japanese restaurant Lung Ta (definitely not a Japanese name). Vandana and Roni met us there later. The food was absolutely delicious and Anya's grandparents treated us all, since it was a birthday celebration. After dinner, we moved onto Nick's Italian Kitchen for dessert where we had a nut brownie with ice cream and chocolate sauce (the best thing on their dessert menu, I think.) By that time, it was late, so we got a taxi and headed home. It was a great way to spend my pre-birthday.

Today, to celebrate, I decided to wear my nice suit. It is a special occasion after all. I've come to realize that it's really up to you to make your birthday exciting, so I'm doing well so far. Vandana and Devika came over this morning to wish me a happy birthday. They had made me breakfast and gave me a box of tea bags as a gift. It was all delicious. Vandana also stuck her head into my class this morning and announced that it was my birthday, prompting congratulations from my students. I really am growing to love my students and teaching their classes.

So far, the weekend is off to a good start. We'll see how the rest of the parties go. In the mean time, I need to make some cards for Phillip and Didi.

Walk in the Clouds

Yesterday I witnessed some amazing weather. I was in my room doing some writing when I happened to look outside and saw what looked like huge plumes of smoke blowing by. I rushed outside to my porch to find that it wasn't smoke, but clouds on their way up the mountain.

I know that fog is really just a low-lying cloud, but this was different than any fog I have ever experienced. You could see the edges and wisps of the clouds as they blew by. If I stuck out my hand, it would be in one of those wisps. It was that close and that clear around it. It was strange to look around me, as each cloud passed by, it was like my vision blurred to my surroundings.

Soon the clouds dispersed and a light rain fell. It was really a beautiful thing to behold.

Spur of the Moment Adventure

Today I had an unexpected adventure. I was walking back up from buying rice in Sidhbari, intending to go back to the Knowledge Center to use the internet there, when Didi called to me from her car, just up the road, “Jenna! Come to the village feast with us!”

Before I go further, I should introduce Didi Contractor. She is an 80-year-old American woman who has been here in India for a long time. (Since before toilet paper came on rolls, she says.) She is an architect of mud houses and is Anya's landlady. Despite being eighty, she is still an active woman and still designs and works on houses. The Stuti I have mentioned before is apprenticed to her. She designed and owns Didipur, the cluster of mud houses where Anya lives.

In any case, I accepted and hopped into her car. We drove nearly all the way up the mountain, much farther than I had ever gone before, to a small temple where the feast was being held. The occasion, as I understand it, is that it's the ninth night of a holiday here where they put on nightly plays of the Ramayana, a great epic. Everyone in Rakkar is welcome to come, and anyone who passed by the temple, including a bus full of people, were stopped and invited to partake.

Long mats were set out in front of the temple on the grass where people sat and were served. First, plates made of large leaves were distributed. Then, a man went around with a large basket of hot rice. Following that, three yellow curries were poured over the rice in succession by other men. The time interval between each food was, it seems, long enough for you to finish eating the previous one. I, however, am not so skilled at eating rice and curry with only my fingers, so I was never quite ready for the next dish.

After the three curries came more rice and three dishes in a brownish sauce. I'm not sure exactly what they were, but it was all delicious. Following those three, an orange rice dessert with dried fruit and bits of cocoanut in it wrapped up the feast. I was the last to finish. I should say that it's amazing how much easier it is to eat hot food with a spoon or fork. Your mouth can handle hotter temperatures than your fingertips can.

All the while, there were two little boys hauling around pitchers of water (which I did not drink as it was obviously neither filtered or boiled) enthusiastically pouring it out for whoever needed more. Once our group was done eating, they pulled up the long mats, swept them off, laid them back down, and ushered in another group of people to eat. Everyone put their leaves away (to be burned or washed, I'm not sure), then used whatever water they had left to wash off their hands. The turmeric in the curries still left yellow stains on my fingers though. “That way everyone will know you have been to the feast,” Didi's friend told me.

That far up the mountain, it was like we were in a cloud with haze hanging everywhere. Even while we ate, a light drizzle fell, but no one seemed to mind. It was hot enough that the cool rain was appreciated.

Life is a lot more interesting, I find, if you leap into invitations. There are so many things I have seen and done even in this month so far if I had stuck to my own plans and declined invites. I wouldn't advice to leap without looking, but it is certainly more fun to go at life here with an adventurous and open spirit.

Settling into a Routine

Now that I am well into my second week of classes, I can finally talk about some kind of routine. I teach my English classes on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Saturdays. This alternates with a computer class for the same group of students on Tuesdays, Fridays, and Sundays. Thursday is always a day off for Jagori staff, as are every other Wednesday, but I teach on those days as well.

On the days that I teach, I get up around 8:45 in the morning, have breakfast, clean up, and orient myself for the day. The Knowledge Center opens up at 10:00, so I head down around then and set up for my class. If I don't have much set up to do, I check my email on the one computer that has internet connection there. My morning class runs from 11:00 to noon and has somewhere around six students. After class, I head home to make some lunch, then come back for the afternoon. My evening class is from 4:00-5:00pm and seems to have slightly more students than my morning class. After that is over, I clean up and go home.

On my days off, I have to do lesson planning, and that frequently requires trips down to Sidhbari to make some printouts and copies for my class.

My duties also include making the Jagori Grameen web site. Now that I have met with Abha, Anup, and Anya on it, I have much more to do. We're aiming to have it up by the end of October at the latest, so I suspect that's how I will use my time between classes from now until then.

As to eating, the meal schedule here is later than I am used to back in the US. Lunch happens between 1:00 and 2:00 usually, and dinner sometime after 7:00. This was a little hard to get used to at first, but it's something I'm adjusting into. Now that the Knowledge Center has been moved down close to my house, and it's usually just Vandana and I there, we don't hold so strictly to the lunch traditions.

However, up at the office, everyone makes their lunch before work in the morning and brings it with them. Then, when enough people feel that it's time for a break, they all gather together and eat. One thing to note is that everyone shares. You pass around your food and everyone takes a little bit, so that by the time all the food has gone around, you have about two or three bites of everyone's lunch. If someone didn't bring any food, the others gather up enough for them to eat. Thus, when I was spending time up at the office before the Knowledge Center moved, I couldn't just bring a peanut butter sandwich for myself. I had to make something that I could share.

Tidbits

I've been here a month now. Lots of little things happen around me that make me smile, but they aren't worth a whole entry on their own. So, here is a collection of tidbits.

My landlady, Doctor Kusum, is one of the most sweet and caring people I have ever met. She has a pretty sizable garden that ranges all around the house, and she frequently brings up the fruits of her garden or little things she has cooked to share with Vandana and I. Through this, I have learned to took Indian corn (this stuff is tougher than American corn), how to eat a pomegranate, and how delicious Indian bananas are (they're little but packed with way more flavor than any banana I have ever had in the USA). Because she goes to the Nishta clinic at 9:00 every morning and Jagori doesn't open until 10:00, she has discovered if she wants to talk to me, it has to be in the morning, and it usually involves waking me up.

This morning, in fact, I was having a vivid dream of looking for a recipe for pumpkin pie from scratch, since this is my favorite food and we are nearing that season. I dreamed I was paging through old cookbooks in a desperate search, when I heard Dr. Kusum's voice. Staggering out of bed and unlocking my screen door, I saw her standing there with a quarter of a pumpkin for me. Still a little delirious from sleep, I stared at it in my hands and thought, “Pie.” It looks like I will need to find this recipe and make use of Anya's toaster oven some time soon.

On another occasion, because I had accidentally tripped on a cord and pulled a socket out of the wall, Dr. Kusum was trying to get an electrician to come to look at it while I was at home. After several tries, she eventually had him come early and wake me up to check on it. It had been hot that night, so I was sleeping on pajama shorts and a tank top. I never even go to my bathroom dressed in that, since my neighbors have a good view of my porch. As I stood there in my shorts while he pushed the socket back into the wall, I felt totally scandalized. It's funny what only one month in a country can do to your sense of modesty.

There is another new foreign arrival at Jagori. Roni, an Israeli girl who has been studying at Dartmouth in the US, has just arrived to do some volunteering and research here during her off semester. Having someone to show around really makes me realize how much I have learned about the area in the last month and how much my confidence has grown. There are still lots of things I don't know, but I can survive now without clinging to anyone else.

One time, when I was riding the bus back from Dharmshala, we passed a small fabric store that was full of Tibetan Buddhist monks. Here, they wear a sort of burgundy robe and have a sunny yellow shirt underneath. As I wondered what a bunch of monks was doing in a fabric shop, I noticed a length of sunny yellow cotton laid out on the counter. It does make sense that everyone, even the monks, buy their own fabric and get clothing tailored.

There is this particular bridge between Sidhbari and Dharmshala that cows really like to congregate on at night. While I haven't seen them there during the day, every single evening that I have come back from Dharmshala after having dinner out or shopping, there are a cluster of three to five cows all sleeping on half of the bridge. It makes a bit of a traffic bottle-neck.

Two nights ago, I went up to McLeod Ganj with Anya, Vandana, Stuti, and Roni for dinner. I have found that most times I go up there, I wind up meeting friends of friends who we didn't come with, but wind up having dinner or dessert with. This time, we met two Swedish girls who Anya had met last weekend at a workshop. In turn, their Tibetan-German friend came along. Then, a friend of Vandana's joined us. Our party of five become nine. This particular restaurant was great. I especially appreciated the large notice at the bottom of the menu saying, “All of our water is boiled in a pressure cooker.” It made me feel brave enough to have chicken. Granted, when the food came, the vegetarian platter looked better than mine. You really can't beat paneer (Indian cottage cheese), even with meat.

On our way back down, we encountered a whole flock of sheep going down the road, driven by their shepherd. It was really a sight to see. Even in Dharmshala, there are reminders that we really are in a rural area.

Anya and I just found a Hindi tutor as well, and met her yesterday. She is very sharp but very sweet too and fell into step the moment we said, “shall we begin?” even though she has never tutored before. I have daily assignments already to do until we meet again on Sunday.

This past Sunday, I did find a church. It was my first adventure of going some place I had never been before by bus, alone. To get there, you have to take buses all the way up to McLeod Ganj, and then walk back down the mountain a little ways, since its right in between two stops. The whole ordeal took me about an hour and a half. Not knowing when the service was, I arrived right around 9:00. It turns out, the church didn't open up until 10:00.

It is an old Gothic style church from the time of colonialism called “The Church of St. John in the Wilderness.” There are two stained glass windows at the front, but the rest are glass. Surrounding it on the mountain side is a sprawling cemetery.

As to the service, I was unimpressed. The pastor lead the songs by leafing through a folder that was handed out to everyone, and seemingly picking hymns at random. He had trouble staying in just one key, but it was good to be singing hymns again. I stubbornly stayed in the key he started in, and I guess I sung loud enough to convince others to as well. There were about 20 or 30 people there. The sermon was given by a guest speaker, and I found it rather centered around her. She kept pitching her new TV station amid more spiritual comments.

While the music and the sermon didn't impress me, what really turned me off was the feeling of community—or lack thereof. It struck me as a church for people passing through. Tourists would come and go. People came with who they came with, didn't talk to anyone else, and then left with the same people. It really lacked warmth. So, I'm going to keep looking for a church I can settle in. Maybe I'll go back to see what it's like when that woman isn't preaching.

I have also been teaching English classes since last Monday. Up until today, I was constantly getting new students and loosing old ones, but I think it's finally evening out at about 6 or 7 students per class. (I teach one in the morning and one in the afternoon.) I have bad lessons and good lessons, but I think I am getting the hang of things. I have a wide range of ages and skills, though they all do know some English from school. There are two boys who must be around 13 years old and a pair of older married women.

Anya's neighbor Maya has a dog named Ginger. Ginger is very enthusiastic and self confident. Yesterday, while I was at Anya's, Maya left Ginger with us while she snuck off to town so that the dog wouldn't follow her. When we deemed it safe, we let Ginger back out. However, as I went home, I met Ginger on the long driveway to the street and she followed me all the way home. I called Anya, and we agreed to meet half way to trade off the dog, since she was causing trouble and jumping all over Dr. Kusum. I dragged her by the collar about a quarter of the way to Anya's where she lay down on the street and rolled onto her back. The instant I let go of her collar to rub her belly, she jumped up and went back up the road again. By the time I caught her again, Anya got to me as well. Relieved, I passed the mischievous dog off. Ginger must have though we were playing a great game of chase.

Shopping

Shopping around here is also a different experience from I’ve ever had at home. First off, there are clothes. I’ve been told that in the cities, most people buy pre-made clothes, whereas out here in the countryside, people mostly get things tailored (or make their own clothes). That involves buying fabric, going to a tailor, getting measurements taken, specifying what style you want everything in, and coming back some time later to pay for it and pick it up. So far, I have three salwar kameez suits done and two at the tailor’s. My first suit took about one week to finish, the last two I have in are estimated at four weeks. It really depends on how busy the tailor is, how many assistants he has, and, in the case of my most recent suit, how healthy the tailor is. It took at least two weeks longer than this tailor originally appraised, because he got very sick and couldn’t sew for a week or so. Getting things tailored requires more patience, but they fit better and you can customize them all you like.

One thing I am really enjoying is the personal touches that different tailors put into the clothing. One point of note is around the cuffs of the pants, the salwar. The cuff is reinforced with stiff interfacing and is about one inch wide. Rather than just stitching the interfacing in and being done with it, every tailor does several rows of machine stitches around the cuff in a sort of decorative pattern. I will take some pictures when I get a chance. Some tailors make the patterns more intricate than others.

It is tough, as someone who sews, when I get a suit back and there are parts of it that I look at and say to myself, “I could have done that better.” What that means, in the long run, is that I’m bound to be really picky with tailors, and always pick the ones that cost a little more and take a little longer. Maybe someone will teach me to stitch my own suits by the time I leave here.

Shopping for food and other supplies is fun too. Most stores here are what we would call “garage stores.” They are made in flat-roofed cement buildings with metal garage doors over the front that are slid up when the store is open. In Rakkar and Sidhbari, these garages are usually not big enough even to hold a car. Each little store has its own selection of things, so you have to know which store has the things you need. Produce stands change their wares as new things come in season or go out of stock. Food is fresh and delicious. There are two food stores practically out my front door, so if I need an extra potato as I’m making dinner, it’s easy to run out for another.

When you buy produce, rice, spices, beans, flour, and the like, shopkeepers weigh what you want on a scale, and charge you based on weight. One time, when buying two tiny heads of garlic, they shop keeper gave them to me for free, since they were worth less than a rupee. Another time, when I tried to buy four little eggplants, they didn’t weigh enough to be a good round price, so this vegetable seller added another one to my bag.

Some shop keepers are very friendly. For example, when I went to buy dictionaries, a notebook, and a few folders from a stationary shop, the shop keeper introduced himself as having visited the United States and wanted to know all about Anya and I. While I perused different dictionaries, he even offered us tea, which we declined. When we finally checked out, he threw in a couple of pens for free for me and a little note pad for Anya.

Other times, you really have to haggle to get a good price. As a foreigner, people will tend to ask you for the full price on something, which is higher than the normal price. By asking for a ‘discount’ they will bring the price down. Some places are harder to haggle at. Anya has told me of how she will sometimes spend ten or fifteen minutes in a store chatting with the shopkeeper, trying to bring the price down. I, however, haven’t gotten the guts to haggle quite so intensely yet.

Although unrelated, I feel that I should mention a major victory for myself. For lunch today, I cooked Indian food from scratch for myself for the first time. And it was delicious! It took about an hour, but it was definitely worth it.

Wildlife

An important part of the experience here is the wildlife. The first thing I noticed in Rakkar were the dogs. Wild dogs wander the streets freely, scavenging for discarded food. The average Indian dog is built like lab, but somewhat smaller. Their tails curl over on top and their ears are half way in between sticking up like a cattle dog and flopping over like a lab. They come in all sorts of colors and coats. Some people do own dogs, however. While you wouldn't want to pet a dog on the street, I have gotten my dog fix from two dogs owned by Anya's neighbors, Ginger and Boey. Because there have been problems with rabid dogs in the not so distant past, most people here are afraid of all dogs. (Don't worry, I'm vaccinated.)

Last week, when I tagging along with Anya to observe her English class at the Shapur Knowledge Center, we found an abandoned puppy in the gutter at our bus transfer in Dharmshala. Its eyes weren't even open yet, and it lay there shivering and whimpering. Anya took some paper, pulled it out of the gutter, and set it on some rags in a corner of the bus stop to dry off. It was a pretty fat little dog, so we assumed it had just lost its mother that morning and hoped that she would come back to find it soon. We stopped back to check on it on the way home that evening and it was gone. Hopefully it's safely back with its mother now. Otherwise, we were planning to take back with us to find a home for it in Rakkar.

The next thing I noticed were the snails. Snails here are nocturnal, but they get everywhere at night, gathering in clumps around whatever they find delicious and slithering slowly up and down the roads. There are no street lights around here and my flashlight can only illuminate so much, so I accidentally step on at least two every night when I come home from visiting Anya or her neighbors. The crunching sound that comes with stepping on a snail really makes you regret what you've just done. It's pretty terrible.

As to monkeys, there aren't any in Rakkar or Sidhbari. While there are plenty further up the mountain in places like Dharmshala and McLeod Ganj, dogs firmly hold the place of scavengers around here. Frankly, I'm glad we have dogs rather than monkeys. They're much less mischievous. I've heard stories of monkeys entering people's houses and helping themselves to the refrigerator or even stealing your shopping bag right out of your hands.

Cats are few and far between. Indians believe that all cats, not just black ones, are unlucky, so few are kept as pets. There is a pretty sandy colored one with a striped tail that hangs out around my house and the neighboring houses though.

Included in the local fauna are also smallish lizards, snakes (though I have yet to see one), and spiders. The spiders here can get leg spans the size of the palm of your hand, but the largest ones I have found in my house are about the size of a fifty cent piece. They don't bother me and I don't bother them.

I finally have a straight answer to the question, “what exactly are you doing over there?” Today, I began to teach my first English class. This is a ten week course that alternates days with a computer class here at the Rakkar Knowledge Center. Since there aren't any text books here or set courses, I had to come up with a full class plan from scratch myself, which is what I have been doing for the last two weeks.

It is also my responsibility to make (and I assume, updated) the Jagori Grameen web site. Anya and another American girl who was here earlier started working on one, but it was far from finished. So far, I have taken the existing layout, and tweaked it to make it easier to navigate and more colorful. I am awaiting orders on what specifically to do next. There is also talk of me making a separate web site for TARA Center, where Jagori hosts workshops. I'm sure that will come when the Jagori Grameen site is up and running.

With my free time, I have been doing my best to adjust to life here. Lately, almost every night I have had an invite to someone's house for dinner, a movie, or both. I have started to take notes as I watch and help others cook. That way, soon, I'll be able to cook respectable India food myself. Most nights I'm not and someone's house, I find myself taking a trip of to Dharmshala or McLeod Ganj for dinner or shopping. My social life here is surprisingly active. During my time to myself, I have been mostly reading and writing. It's enough to keep me content.

Yesterday, at the birthday party of one of Anya's neighbors, Maya, I finally met Sister Celia. She is the principal of a local school and Catholic nun. She invited me to come see the convent some time this week and come to one of the daily Mass services. I'm not sure who has been gossiping to who, but as always, my reputation as a singer proceeds me. It seems that every new person I meet says, “And I hear you are an excellent singer.” This was no exception. Sister Celia commented that her school needs a music teacher and that I could teach her students a singing class. Having missed all of the singing basics by joining choir only in my senior year of high school, I politely declined. Then Didi, Maya's mother, said that I should go to the protestant church up in McLeod Ganj, as they need lots of help with their music. We'll see what I get sucked into. I do love singing and sharing that with others.

Comforts & Adventures

While it is true that I'm living in a rural village in Northern India, it is not without its comforts. First and foremost: Skippy Super Chunk peanut butter. There's really something wonderful about having the peanut butter you grew up on, especially for all of the peanut butter toast and sandwiches I make. Vandana likes to make fun of me for how excited I get about it.

Secondly, I now have a small fridge. It's bigger than anything they would allow in an Oberlin dorm room, but isn't anywhere close to full size. It's surprising how much we rely on refrigerators for our food needs. I didn't quite realize it until I was without one. This is the official Shansi fridge now, so it will get passed down to other fellows that come after me. I'm sure there will be a lot of other stuff like that too, but since Anya and I are the first two fellows here, it's hard to say exactly what else.

And then there's toilet paper. While I am starting to get the hang of the water method, it's nice to have a few rolls at home.

All this, and other good and familiar foods, is made possible by Dharmshala and McLeod Ganj, two bigger cities up the mountain to the west of Rakkar. McLeod Ganj in particular is a mecca for hippies and foreign tourists, so the stores up there sell all sorts of imported goods. It is still hard, though, to find any kind of dark chocolate. Indian's don't like it, so the most frequently found chocolate is Cadbury.

As far as internet goes, it takes some effort to come by. I don't have any at home so I have to go looking for it, but there are options. First, there is one internet connection at the Jagori Knowledge Center. You plug in a cell phone with a USB cord and get relatively slow internet that way. That one phone is passed around to whoever needs it during the day. Secondly, the other NGO in Rakkar, right up the road from Jagori, has a computer lab with relatively slow but reliable internet. It's wireless, so I could take my laptop up and surf from the comfort of my own computer. Next, there is a tiny internet cafe down in Sidhbari. It costs a bit, so it's a last resort. Then, two of Anya's neighbors have wireless internet. One is out of town right now and graciously allowed Anya use of his internet while he was gone for the summer, and she has invited me to come along sometimes. Her other neighbor Bryan is almost always around, but he is alright letting people come over and use his internet sometimes. These two neighbors have the fastest connections around, but they frequently go in and out.

This past Tuesday was the not-so-annual Jagori picnic/retreat. In preparation, everyone was assigned to bring along some kind of food. The Knowledge Center team (that includes Anya, Vandana, and I) was assigned to make puris. A puri is a deep fried flat bread. I had learned how to make a basic flat bread before, but frying it was a new experience. The three of us made the dough the night before (wheat flour and water needed together) and then got up early the next morning to roll them out and fry them. Somehow in the process, I manged to dip two of my fingers into the boiling oil as I flipped a puri. Thankfully, I live above a doctor who loves to garden. I was able to keep aloe on the burns and, though painful for a while, it kept them from blistering at all. That plant really works wonders.

The whole staff piled into four taxi vans (putting more people into one vehicle than I thought possible at first sight), and headed East across the valley and up into the mountains. Our car remained entertaining as most of the women sang enthusiastically at the top of their lungs all the way there. By the end of the day, I was able to sing along with a few of their songs.

We took a few stops along the way to our final destination. First was at a small village where there was a small art gallery done by a famous Sikh artist. Following that we walked down to a temple along the river, nick-named 'The Fish Temple,' because the stretch of river behind the temple was the only area that fish gathered. We threw some food to the fish, and then moved on.

Next, we stopped at another temple to a goddess (I'm not sure which) high in the mountains. This one was built into a cave. There were two entrances. One, which most people took, was a little like spelunking. You had to climb up through a tunnel in the rock, crawl on your hands and knees, and even wriggle on your stomach to get into the sanctuary. I turned around at the point where I had to crawl through a puddle in my brand new white salwar kamiz. Then someone pointed out a slanted metal staircase that led up the other way. I took that instead. The inside of the cave was decorated with all sorts of trappings and smelled of incense. It definitely isn't what I expected when they said we were heading for a temple.

Our final destination was Asha Puri Devi, a temple to another goddess on the top of a mountain. This particular one was carved of stone and seemed really old. The few from it was spectacular. After everyone visited the temple, we spread out some reed mats and had our picnic in its shade. There was so much food passed around, everyone was stuffed by the end and there were still left-overs.

Afterward, Abha had everyone sing the welcome song to me and the other new person. Immediately following that, Abha announced that she heard I was a good singer and should sing a song for them right then. I sung the first thing I could think of, 'La Promessa', one of my favorites from my recital last semester. After I was done, various other people were called on to sing and dance in the circle. It really was a lot of fun.

On the way home there was more singing too. Anya and I led some of the others in a few English songs as well. We made a number of stops (many of them for reasons I wasn't sure of), but the last one they called a 'chai break.' Even so, I was surprised when, as we all sat by the side of the road, someone came around with cups of chai. I'm not sure where they found boiled water and milk to make it. As we sipped our tea, Anya and I were sitting on either side of Vandu (another one of the three Vandanas on my team) who decided to paint our nails while we waited. Now, my finger nails are light pink. I think it's been since middle school at least since I had my finger nails painted.

Weather

The weather here takes some getting used to for a Minnesota girl like me. India is north of the equator, but much closer to it than America is. This means that the summers are hot and the winters are mild. When I first arrived in Delhi, the heat was almost unbearable for me, and I was told that it could have been a lot hotter. However, upon arriving in Himachal Pradesh, it was a lot nicer. Granted, it has frequently been hotter than I'd like, being at a much higher elevation keeps the weather cooler. To my understanding, winter here doesn't really get below freezing often, but it is still cold enough to be a bother when you don't have any kind of central heating. I need to get a space heater sometime before then.

This time of year is monsoon season, and this area is rated for the second highest annual rainfall in the country. It rains at least once a day and is humid the rest of the time. I left my laundry out to dry under my overhang yesterday afternoon and it's still not dry yet. I hope it doesn't mold. Today, it has been raining pretty constantly since well before dawn, but other days there is only a morning shower and the sky clears up by lunch time. The rainy season runs through the summer and into September. Last year, it lasted well into October. Here, however, it does rain some outside of monsoon season as well.

Unfortunately for me, my 100 rupee umbrella I bought in Delhi broke after only three uses. I hear there is a man up in Dharmshala that can repair umbrellas, so I will need to visit him, or get myself a new one, pretty soon.

Living in Himachal

I really have a very comfortable living situation here, which Anya found for me before I arrived. It's an apartment on the second floor of a mud brick house. As it turns out, despite the dustiness, mud houses are much better to live in than concrete houses, the alternative around here. The walls absorb the moisture during the rainy season, keep the house cooler during the summer, and warmer during the winter.

This particular house has three apartments on the top floor, one is unoccupied, but the third is occupied by Vandana, a girl from Delhi who recently came up here to work for Jagori. We have already become friends over a love for books and have shared several meals. On the first floor lives our landlady Dr. Kusum and her husband. She is a medical doctor in a local clinic and is an incredibly sweet woman. She is always coming up to see how I'm doing and giving us organic fruits and vegetables from her garden.

My apartment consists on three rooms, each opening separately onto the balcony. First, there is my bedroom, secondly, my kitchen, and thirdly my bathroom. I have uploaded some pictures of each. My bedroom has a desk, shelves, a little closet, a plank bed, and a large pad mattress on the floor. I've taken to sleeping on the floor because it is much more comfortable than the plank bed, which makes a nice couch. I don't have internet at home, however, so I have to find an internet cafe or use one of the NGOs' computer labs when I want to check my email and such.

My kitchen is pretty simple with shelves, a sink, and a stove. The stove is connected to a gas cylinder, which I have to buy about twice a year. I am still in the market for a small refrigerator, but most people around here make do without one. Unfortunately, I share my home with some insects, namely 'silver fish.' Vandana warned me that they like to eat through books, clothes, and food. To combat that, I got some insect repellant pellets to stash on every shelf and in every drawer, and socked up on air tight plastic containers. Also important to my kitchen is a pressure cooker. I have to boil water in that every day to drink so as to kill any bacteria and amoeba in the water that could make me sick.

My bathroom, well, that's even more simple. I have a sink just outside the door, and inside there is a toilet and several spigots for washing. Traditionally, Indian's use a little water bucket to clean themselves after using the toilet instead of toilet paper. I have yet to master this, so I got some toilet paper up in McLeod Ganj. Bathing happens in the same space as well. There isn't a shower or any hot water. I fill a large bucket with some water, than use a smaller scooper bucket to pour it over me. This morning I discovered how to use my heating coil, a coil of metal that when dropped into the bucket will warm up the water, and I can already seen that that will be very nice come cooler weather.

The area I live in is at the foot of the Lesser Himalayas. And, for being 'lesser', these mountains are incredibly impressive. The slope of the land here isn't so steep, but it begins to tire you out when you're always going up or going down. I'm sure I'll get stronger legs and lungs soon enough.

First Impressions

It has been a very busy few days since I first stepped foot out into Delhi at something like 12:30 am on Saturday morning. Anya, my senior fellow, picked me up at the airport and we took a hired car back to Abha's house for the night. I briefly met Abha in the morning before she departed for a trip of her own. The rest of Saturday was a whirl-wind shopping adventure around Delhi with Anya and some friends. We picked up a number of things I would need that would be harder to find up in Himachal Pradesh.

The most exciting stop was Nalli's Saris. I would highly recommend it if you are ever in Delhi. Anya's friend recommended it as a good place to get fabric for salwar camis, which are what women wear up where we are. (My impression is that it is farther south in India that most women wear saris on most days. Up here, they seem to be for special occasions.) As we approached the entrance to the store, we were greeted by two security guards and one woman, who asked to search our purses. Upon entering the first floor, we were a bit overwhelmed by all the fancy saris and we began to wonder if we were in the right place for our budgets. As it turns out, the prime minister's wife and daughter were there, doing sari shopping. That certainly explained the extra security, and spoke to the quality of the merchandise.

Up on the third floor we found what we were looking for. Behind long counters manned by clerks were cabinets stacked with folded fabric. As an extremely jet-lagged fabric enthusiast, I was totally overwhelmed. We found the suit sets section marked with affordable prices (this means that they had selected fabrics for the pants, the shirt, and the wrap all together) and started asking the clerks for colors we were interested in. The would take a stack down for us to look through and put it back when we weren't interested. You could hold up the fabric in front of yourself and examine it in front of a mirror to make sure the colors and patterns worked with your complexion. It was great fun, and I walked out with the makings for five suits. I can't wait to get them tailored. It will be way more comfortable than jeans and t-shirts, especially in this weather.

Another interesting adventure for the day came at a coffee house. In another strip mall, we escaped the heat into a chain coffee shop. The atmosphere was so unlike American coffee shops, I would have hardly recognized it. For one, you were served your drink and pastries rather than ordering at the counter. But most strikingly, was that you almost had to shout to be heard by those around your table. It was a lively place with loud music and rumbling bass. Not the sort of place I would go to study. I hear that there are tamer coffee shops, though.

That night, Anya and I took a night bus up to Dharmsala. It was about an eleven-hour trip, and not much sleep was had thanks to the constant honking (on India roads, it's an “I'm coming up behind you” courtesy and not rude at all) followed by the mad twisting and turning up mountain roads. Once we arrived in Dharmsala, we got a taxi down to Rakkar, the village that I am now living in. While it does take some time to get in between, I was amazed at how close I am to there. As a crow flies, it's not far at all, though it's straight up a mountain.

Determined to fight off my jet-lag, after a short nap, I went up to McLeod Ganj with Anya and some of her neighbors and friends. McLeod Ganj is further up the mountain from Dharmsala and is where the Tibetan Government in Exile is housed. It is also a mecca for foreigners and shops selling foreign goods. I was able to find some cereal, pasta, and toilet paper to keep me supplied back home. We took a leisure eating tour of the town, first having pastries and coffee at an Italian bakery, french fries and drinks at a Tibetan restaurant, and finally ended the night with a late dinner at a Korean restaurant (where I tasted the best vegetarian sushi I have ever had). By that time my jet-lag had caught up with me with a vengeance, and I even had to have the taxi driver show me how to get back home. Thank goodness my land lady is well known.

One thing that really surprised me is how so many people know so many other people. As we headed for the bakery, we found a woman who had been here on a long retreat that was friends with one of Anya's friends, and so she joined us for cake. Then we ran into two other Americans, one of whom knew Anya's neighbor, so they joined us for fries. It turns out that the other one had studied Hindi under Virendra Singh, the same fantastic teacher I just spent the summer learning from. It was really fascinating talking to all of those people to hear what they were doing abroad. It was everything from personal growth, to fair trade business, to freelance writing.

Although Rakkar is rural village, it is far from quiet, even at night; honking cars, noisy conversations, crowing roosters, pounding, loud traditional music echoing across the valley, dogs barking, and an occasional roll of thunder. At the same time, it's a relaxed sort of noise, the kind that makes you feel at home.

As I finally lay in bed last night, it really stunned me that this is to be my home for the next two years. My language skills and knowledge of the culture are fairly minimal, and I don't really know what I'll even be doing yet. But here I am and here I'll stay. While I float between apprehension and excitement, I know this will probably be two of the best years of my life.

Departing

It's hard to believe that tomorrow I depart for India. On this side of things, two years seems like a long time, but I'm sure it will fly by.

I only have one layover tomorrow in Amsterdam. It's in the wee hours of the morning, so I doubt I'll be able to set foot outside of the airport, but we'll see. Anya is meeting me at the airport in Delhi, and I really look forward to meeting her face to face. I look forward to meeting all the people around Jagori that she's talked about too.

Somehow, I'm over being nervous, though I'm not quite excited yet. I'm sure those emotions will flip-flop all the way to Delhi, but actually setting foot in India can't be anything but exciting.