BANDH!!!

Bandh is a Hindi word meaning “closed” and in the context of today’s events it means government strike!  All civil servants strike, this includes postal workers, auto-rickshaw drivers (the ones who aren’t greedy, wait, let me qualify that statement, the ones who aren’t SO greedy that they would go against personal values and possibly risk physical harm to charge people over 10x the normal fairs) and even some police!  The strike takes place throughout the entire country and in some areas that have strong leftist movements, mainly Kerela and Kolkata, there is violence.  This is mostly limited to stone throwing, but if the roving bands of leftists see a government agency operating (e.g. a post office) the leftists have been known to destroy and loot the facility.  As it turns out, most of the government workers don’t strike for ideological reasons, they do it out of fear for their personal safety.  The fear of the leftist groups is only half of it though, it is compounded by the fact that much of the police force strikes as well.  This opens up today to all sorts of other unsavory characters seeking to act with relative impunity.  All this and the biggest victims are the day laborers who are forced to lose a day’s wages. 

For most though, this Bandh is best described by Uncle who put it as, “today is a vacation, you go get a bottle of liquor, a whole chicken, then you fry up the whole chicken and you sit around playing cards all day.”

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Goa: Land of the Hippies

As I mentioned in my previous post, the bus ride from Bangalore to Goa is 14 hours long, that ended up being a slight over estimate as it only took us 13 hours to get there.  It’s beginning to hit me how big this country really is… and how terrible their infrastructure is.  Driving the same distance on an American freeway would only take about 6 hours.  But, it was well worth it; Goa is incredible. 

The guide book mentioned that in the 1960’s Goa became a hippie hotspot and that some of them stayed.  I underestimated how true this statement really was and in turn was pleasantly surprised by how saturated the place was with hippies!  Just for perspective, we were staying in Anjuna which is known for its hippies, but still. 

Near our hostel a few of the locals had set up shop and were selling hippie clothes, beach wear, various trinkets and some basic drug paraphernalia.  While I was perusing the shacks one of the shop keepers went over to a guy checking out a mini-bong across the small alley.  She asked if he wanted it and he replied in the affirmative but added that he had no use for it because he was “dry.”  Without missing a beat the hostel owner came over and asked the guy what he wanted.  A few minutes and one, possibly two, drug deal(s) later everyone went on their merry way.  Maybe 15 minutes after that when I was heading back to my room, my curiosity got the better of me.  As I walked by the hostel owner I inquired as to what the drug laws were here.  He very casually told me that all drugs are illegal and the penalties are very severe, but that for a couple hundred rupees a week to the police the whole legality issue could be avoided.  He also added that there’s almost no drug related violence in the area and that makes things easy. Then he offered me drugs.  

What a place‽

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A Jew in Asia

As I'm sitting on a bus from Bangalore to Goa (N.B. a 14 hour trip - equally as long as my flight from JFK to Delhi) I've got plenty of time to sit and reflect on my day and my time here in general.  One occurrence, that I feel is representative of several other interactions concerning this topic, keeps popping back into my mind.  Today on the way home from school Tom and I stopped to chat with a guy we've seen several times on our usual route, we’ll call him “Dipak.”  The topic of religion came up and once I made the admission that I’m Jewish his first and only question was, “Really? I wouldn’t have thought so.  You have a very average size nose.” We all laughed, I kindly explained the stereotype and we moved on.

In these situations I try to keep in the forefront on my mind that I chose to hold the belief that we are all infinitely ignorant, no matter how much you know, there will always be something you don’t.  It’s humbling and a good reminder not to judge others on a comment that we think is stupid or naïve.

By far the most common response to hearing that I’m Jewish is something along the lines of a bewildered smile and a series of questions best summarized by my favorite 4^th grade boy, Thowfiq (sounds very much like “Kofig,” which is what I’ve been calling him for a month now, that is, until he corrected me yesterday).

Thowfiq: Which religion are you?

Josh: I’m Jewish.

T: Muslim?

J: No, I’m a Jew.

T:  Christian?

J: No.

T: Hindu?

J: No.

T: (look of bewilderment) Muslim?

…

Great kid…

Lastly, the least common, but most endearing, response I’ve received thus far to my admission is best exemplified by that of my host father, Ram (or as he has affectionately become known by, Uncle). 

Josh: (as part of a longer conversation) Ya, I’m Jewish.

Uncle: Oh, you’re Jewish.  The Jews have done really well in India.  They’re good business men and have really helped improve the communities they live in.  They’re some of the only upper class in India that really gives back. 

… 30 minutes later after a brief overview of Jewish history in India, the major accomplishments of the Jews in India and many of Uncles personal views on Jews in general…

Josh: Wow, I never really knew anything about Jews in the sub-continent!

Uncle: Here’s an article about the inventor of Drip Irrigation, an Indian Jew from Kerela and here are a few books you might be interested in. 

Josh: Thanks!

These are just a few of the more memorable interactions I've had with the locals involving the topic of religion, I’m sure there will be more to come. 

Now here’s for the sad part: a few days ago there was a terrorist attack in Delhi where an Israeli diplomat’s car was bombed.   There is not a long history of anti-Semitism in this country, but it’s here (like pretty much everywhere else in the world) and from time to time it rears its ugly head (the last attack on Jews in India was in 2008 when the Chabad house in Mumbai was assaulted by terrorists).  C’est la vie.

It sure is an interesting place to be a Jew. 

Kerela: God's Own Country

“God’s Own Country” is the hallmark of the tourist industry in Kerela. Here are a few interesting facts about “God’s Own Country.” They have more mosquitoes than anywhere else I have ever been, ever. Also, I’m not sure how long mosquitoes can live without food, but these ones have just about found the limit and are thirsty. The state of Kerela is among the very few places in the world that has voted communist leaders into power and peacefully alternate between the communist and capitalist leadership on a rough 4-year cycle. It’s also 95F and 100% humidity in what they refer to as, “winter.”

I was traveling with four other volunteers on this fine excursion. Roz, mid sixties, is from somewhere in England and she has been in India for a while now volunteering at an orphanage. She loves to read and has accumulated a vast wealth of knowledge over the years that she enjoys sharing with us (we enjoy it too). Jess, 18, is from Edinburgh, Scotland and volunteers at the same orphanage as Roz. She is a fun girl who’s up for anything and appreciates the adventure. Matt, 18, is from somewhere else in England and volunteers for a company called Dream a Dream as a sports coach. He has a great sense of humor and one of the most chilled out and easy going people I’ve met here. And the aforementioned Tom was the fourth and final of my travel companions.

We started off in Cochin and visited some historical sites including Jew Town! There’s a 500 year old synagogue there that had some pretty cool indigenous influences (no cameras allowed inside though). Also, cool fact about Cochin, the inventor of Drip Irrigation (the irrigation technique that was used to “make the desert bloom” in Israel), Eliahu Bezalel (http://www.indianexpress.com/oldStory/85591/) is an Indian Jew who immigrated to Israel in 1955.

The following night we went on a house boat in the Back Waters of Kerela. The Back Waters of Kerela were formed by siltation from the river that flows into the golf and are used for transportation and irrigation of the gigantic rice patties. The tourist industry has dubbed these Back Waters, “The Venice of the East.” I’m not sure who else calls them that, but it does have a ring to it. The house boat was massive, compared to what I was expecting at least, double-decker with a length of about 90’ and a beam of about 20’. We motored through the Back Waters until sunset when we were obligated to tie up for the night to allow the locals to drag their fishing nets across the water and had a leisurely evening. THIS is the life, and at $18 for accommodation on the boat and 3 meals, an affordable one at that.

After the river boat, Roz spent some time in the Ashram of the Hugging Mother. My other three travel companions and I hopped in the car with Francis, our trusty tour guide/driver and headed up into the mountains! The foot hills and even the sides of some of the mountains were cultivated into endless tea plantations. The villages came and went with the blink of an eye and the already precarious Indian road seems much more daunting when one particularly poorly placed pot hole could send you over the un-guarded edge. With all that, we eventually made it up to Thekkady where we rode elephants, went to a traditional dance/fighting show and hung around the town. We also went to a nature reserve where we were supposed to be able to see tigers. We didn’t see any, but we did see tons of monkeys, awesome monkeys. There were several working together to clean each other and the rest were trying to break their way into the snack shack. There was one special monkey that was able to steal Pepsi from Tom and Jess, he was a Pepsi fiend.

The following day consisted of driving out of the mountains, picking up Roz, driving back to Cochin and getting on the bus home. We arrived in Bangalore at 7am the next day with a full day of teaching ahead of us. Good times!

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Welcome to India!

After three flights and roughly 30 hours of traveling I’m finally here in Bangalore (approx. 8580 miles from home).  The colors, the noise, the smells and sheer mass of people are all equally astonishing.

My home stay in a nice area of Bangalore called Cooke Town and I live there with the host father, Ram, the host mother, Ammini, a boarder named Hemant, a helper/boarder named Tuktuki and another volunteer named Tom.  Ram is 71, looks 40 and worked for a British chemical company called ICI until last year.  He has a book for everything and knowledgeable on many things under the sun.  Ammini is 65, looks 50 and gives singing lessons on a daily basis as well as run the household.  She loves cooking and is pretty darn good at it, and as Ram put it, “I don’t go anywhere near the kitchen when she’s cooking, that’s her domain.” Hemant is 25, is from Rajasthan and works here in Bangalore for an SAP consulting firm.  He’s looking to get married soon and will probably only be around for another few months.  Tuktuki is 13 and is working in the house until she can get her papers to go to school.  Her father is a construction worker in Kolkata and her mother works in Ammini’s sister’s house, Tuktuki was living in a slum in Kolkata with distant relatives until Ram and Ammini took her in.  Lastly, Tom is 25 and he finished University in England a year and worked in a factory for a year to pay off loans and save up money for this trip, he works at the same school as I do. 

Before Bangalore grew into the bustling metropolis that it is today and had, what could barely pass as, a sewer system put into place, all of the refuse was thrown in small alley ways behind the houses.  These alley ways didn’t have any sort of draining feature to them and therefore needed to be cleaned and thus developed a whole workforce of people whose job it was to clean up everybody’s waste.  The Annasawmy School was started for the children of these workers in 1909, Tom and I volunteer at that School.  We work in a building dubbed “The Learning Center.” The primary goal of the center is to help improve the student’s English, the secondary goals of the center are to help the students improve their creative writing, reading comprehension, presentations/public speaking, etiquette, social skills, health and hygiene.  The children that we work with range from 5 -15 years old, they are very disciplined and seem to have a profound understanding that their education is their ticket to a new life; it is inspiring to see.

Here's a few of the pictures so far.  When there are more, they will be added to the same album.

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