So here it is: my last blog post from India. Tomorrow I'm flying from Varanasi to Delhi, then Delhi to Newark, and finally Newark to LAX. At 9:30 AM I'll be back home. I've had the "Oh wow you're leaving! When will you be back?" conversation with my rickshaw driver, my co-workers, and my gueshouse.
At the beginning of my time in Varanasi, I was eating dinner at a restaurant near my guesthouse, and an Indian girl asked if she could sit down with me and talk. I said yes, and we had a conversation about our educations, what we were doing, etc. At one point, she asked if I was staying here and asked how much I was paying per night (Indians don't have the same hangups about talking about money as Americans do). After I told her, she started telling me about the dormitory she stayed in, and how much cheaper it was, and how I was only staying here because there were other westerners around and it made me more comfortable. Her tone was somewhat accusatory and made it seem like, because I was working in India for the summer, I shouldn't want to be around westerners. I've been thinking about that conversation ever since it ended, and I couldn't figure out what bothered me about it.
At first (in my head), I was defensive about my decisions and was angry about her accusations. But then I came to a realization. So what? So what if I want to be around foreigners? I did make a conscious decision to stay in a more touristy area in the hopes of meeting other westerners in Varanasi (that didn't really work out though). And can you blame me? I'm staying here alone for the summer...it's only natural to want to be around people from your culture, who you recognize. I came in to the summer after spending the semester in & around Jaipur. Yes, with a group of 21 other Americas, but our staff was Indian and so were our homestays. I had a group of people I could talk with and relate to. And I was worried about what would be like to be alone for the summer. It hasn't been bad at all - I've seen 3 friends from my program who were/are still in India, my Hindi teacher and her husband, met an Irishman working at an anti-human trafficking NGO, spent time with my boss at her in-law's home, met two women from Holland at the stencils workshop, met a guy from North Carolina who teaches in Seoul, had good conversations with my rickshaw wallah, turned "come see my shop" into somewhat of a friendship with a 14-year-old, etc. I think the only time I really felt lonely was during my time in the villages, and even then I was surrounded by people.
Anyway, this "so what?" has morphed in to a realization of sorts. I can do India. I can act Indian. But at the end of the day, I'm still American. I prefer coffee to chai and sitting toilets to squat toilets. I'd rather wear jeans than a sawar set. I'm not good at waterfalling. I like toilet paper and still haven't figured out how to get truly clean from a bucket shower. I wish there were crosswalks and that people on the road followed traffic rules. But just because I know these things about myself and recognize them doesn't mean that I don't like these things about India or that I don't like India as a whole. That's completely untrue - I already know that I would come back in a heartbeat. I still drink chai when offered and have gotten really good at using a squat toilet. I wear sawar sets (and haven't worn jeans since January). I've figured out a trick to waterfalling better. I can cross the street and not have a heart attack in a rickshaw. But at the end of the day these things I prefer or "would rather" are deeply ingrained in who I am and how I think things should be. And, as Dipti always tells me when we talk about Rangsutra's projects, "It takes time." It takes time to fully abandon your own culture and embrace a new one. Part of surviving in a foreign country, especially (I think) in a developing one, is mediating between "yours" and "theirs", "familiar" and "unknown". And mediate I do. If that means that sometimes I need pasta and apple pie for dinner, than so be it. I don't care. And I don't think I could've gotten through the semester if I couldn't have had the occasional meal at Anokhi Cafe, or worn western clothes (almost) whenever I wanted. Sometimes this need for mediation manifested itself in bizarre ways - like the time Andrew and I watched the U.S. men's figure skating championships over ISP, and got SO into it. Or like how we bought a coffee maker and ground coffee beans with a mortar & pestle so that we could have real coffee.
Anyway, that got kind of rambly, but you get my point. I've also realized that no matter what, Indians will generally see me as a tourist - a wealthy westerner with money to spend. Even though one of the first things our Hindi teachers taught us to say was, "I am not a tourist," it's easier said than done.
It's hard to separate my time in India with SIT from my time in India traveling from my time in India with RangSutra (though I will have to for the reflection paper I have to send to my school as a part of the grant I got to fund this experience). They are all very interconnected - I came in to contact with RangSutra through SIT. Even though I want to say that interning with them has been the highlight of my time in India, I don't feel like I can because that would minimize my other experiences or make them seem less significant than they are. This was just the experience that allowed me to focus specifically on what I'm interested in and has made me realize that this is the kind of work I want to do in the future. I've started looking at graduate programs in International Development & Business/Economics. Oh my!
I can't believe I'm saying goodbye to India after spending the past 6 months here. I know I'll be back someday, hopefully soon, and hopefully as more than a tourist.
I wrote a grand total of 45 blog posts while I was here. I was hoping for 50, but 45 is just as good.
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