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