elikarma: September 2010

Tuesday, September 28, 2010

Musings and snapshots from life in India

I suppose that seeing the word "terror" on a newspaper is never funny, but this time I laughed:

Getting around in Delhi is a challenge. From a distance, you see order: lanes are painted white, traffic lights are in place, and there are even police officers directing traffic. Looking more closely, it’s a whole new world. You think that this is a two-lane road? Guess again. Depending on the combination of cars, auto-rickshaws, bicycle rickshaws, and mopeds/motorbikes, you could have any combination of three to eight vehicles in a row. The traffic lights? Really unnecessary, because as long as you honk your horn while crossing the intersection, they can be ignored. And the traffic police – I usually see them wave their hand or blow the whistle when things get really bad.

The most interesting phenomenon can be observed when trying to make a right turn (thus crossing the other lane of traffic). If there is no traffic light or policeman, you must make this turn at your own judgment. At times, there could be a backup on the road that you are trying to turn onto – but no worries, we will make the turn anyway, and block the entire other opposing lane of traffic, even though we could already see that our path is blocked, and thus predict this developing gridlock. Once in this situation, there’s only one thing left to do which will really not move traffic at all, but is done nonetheless: honk the horn, because of course you are not in fault for making a turn towards a blocked intersection, the people in front of you should move!

This traffic mentality is bizarre. It’s an every-vehicle-for-himself mentality, leading to everybody getting nowhere at once. Everyone inches and squeezes as further ahead they can go, irrespective of any other vehicle on the road.

This traffic can drive me crazy, especially with the honking. That’s why I was relieved to find out that I could start using the Delhi metro for my work commute to East Delhi. The stations are comfortably ventilated, and the fare is cheap. Getting onto the platform, there are metal fences on the edge, preventing people from falling on the tracks. There are gaps in these fences where the train opens its doors. People queue up along the edge of these fences to make sure that they don’t block the doorway, as noted on the pavement. And here comes our ultramodern train, complete with A/C. Sounds nice, right?

Once the train pulls up, forget the line. They collapse on the doors before they open. The people trying to get off the train often cannot , due to the overpowering rush of people trying to get on a usually already overpacked train. No worries, because sometimes if you are lucky, by your door may be a delhi metro worker who pulls people off the train. This person is an unmoving rock in a sea of people moving towards the door. Like moses, he parts the crowd and reaches into the train for his quarry that is desperately trying to reach the platform. For those people who make it onto the train, check out how packed they are.

These transportation issues led me to find other means of getting around delhi.

Thursday, September 23, 2010

Mumbai (Bombay)

Victoria train station

the south shore of mumbai. check out the waterfront property!

I just got back from Mumbai two days ago. I went to Mumbai because Yom Kippur and Ganpatti were three days apart. Two festivals, two religions, one city - it seemed like the perfect opportunity to see Mumbai, which is the location of the biggest Ganpatti celebration. Ganpatti is the holiday for Ganesh, the god that has the head of an elephant. The story goes that Ganesh got his elephant head because his father (Krishna, I believe) accidentally cut it off while Ganesh was guarding his mother while she was bathing. Krishna had not met his son before, and pledged to replace his head with the first creature he saw, which was an elephant. The holiday takes place for eleven days during which Hindus pray to Ganesh statues found in temples and private homes. On the final day, everyone takes their statue to the water, and immerses it. This is supposed to help Ganesh return to his home. The most popular place to see this happening is Chowpatti beach, which was full of thousands of people. Some of the statues were at least 15-20 feet tall, and required 100+ people to swim them out into the bay. The entire city, and especially the streets around the beach, is one gigantic party. People parade their statue towards the beach for the final immersion. People are dancing and singing to music played by marching bands equipped with drums and an allotment of other various instruments while red paint (Ganesh's color) is thrown on everything and everyone. It was the highlight of my trip to Mumbai.

a family has a ganesh ceremony before ganesh gets sent home via the ocean

the parade/party. the entire city was like this!

a bigger ganesh in the streets
first ganesh ceremony at night

And yes, I also fasted there, which is always a fun annual ritual. I spent yom kippur with the indian diaspora. There are roughly 5000 living in this community, and there are over ten places of worship around Mumbai. The origins of this community are traced to both baghdad and europe, which accounts for the familiarity I felt during the services. The Indian tunes were very similar to the Iraqi tunes.

By an island mosque

elephanta island

pensive at elephanta island

dhaba ghat! the giant washing center and the train tracks...

can you see how high they are?

and i was nervous they were gonna fall while waving (i didn't ask them too. they just saw me taking a picture)

Monday, September 13, 2010

India first impressions

As of this moment, September 10th, 2010, I have been in India for one month. I’m living in New Delhi, the capital. This place is awesome!

The first thing you notice is the traffic - it makes midtown New York during rush hour, or the upper east side the first night of rosh hashana (pick your analogy), look like child’s play. The public transportation system in India, until recently, was non-existent (the metro just opened in south delhi last week. It was running in the north for about 6 months). People get around in cars, motorbikes, or rickshaws (a motorcycle turned into a passenger vehicle). There are public buses, but they always seem to be bursting with people. While in traffic, it’s extremely noisy – everyone loves to honk here. It’s actually considered to be a part of how you drive. For example: “oh, I’m making a left turn: honk honk” or “oh, I’m passing this person: honk honk.” At first the fact that everyone’s honking can be very confusing, but then you realize that this does have a basis: car’s here don’t have mirrors. The ones that do have mirrors are often folded inward, or people remove them. The honking makes the streets unbearably loud – earplugs have become my best friend.

The food is delicious, although I do find myself craving a simple turkey sandwich. For lunch I get a home cooked Indian meal called a dhaba (I think?) that comes in 4 containers. It’s pretty cool – I’ll have to post a picture.

I constantly compare this place to Ethiopia (given that Ethiopia has been the other place I lived abroad for an extended period of time). To be 100% honest, much of this place reminds me of Ethiopia. Same extremes of wealth (really poor alongside really ridiculous luxury), same shoddy construction methods (people fixing roads with their hands), and Indians hold their culture with almost the same pride and intensity that Ethiopians did. Some obvious differences is that the wealthy here are much more wealthy than Ethiopia, and that there are many more people here. Ethiopia definitely wins on the public transport though – the private minibus system they had in addia ababa there made the city very easy to get around in.

Some background: I’m here for nine more months as a Fogarty research scholar, doing a research project on spinal tuberculosis. This is a disease that is not as common as pulmonary TB, but given the fact that India has the largest percentage of the world’s TB cases (20%) there are many available cases here for me to study. The researchers I’ve met have been extremely helpful in assisting me with my project. I’m currently preparing to apply for ethics committee approval to perform the study, and data collection should happen starting in December.

I found an apartment pretty quickly – I moved into an area called Defense Colony. It’s considered one of the nicer areas of south Delhi. In my apartment search I met lots of foreigners, and a few Indians, that have become friends. I connected with the Israeli community here as well, which has been really nice, especially on Friday night (if you know anything about me you must know how much I love those Shabbat dinners). The US embassy has a pretty nice gym (complete with a pool, bowling alley, and tennis court) that I joined, and I’ve started taking piano lessons again from a teacher here. I take hindhi 2-3 times per week, but come January I think I’m going to switch to farsi (there’s a class here that I can take at the Persian cultural center) and finally learn that.

Last week I took my first trip outside of Delhi to Amritsar, an area in Punjab (Annie, anyone?). Amritsar is right next to the Pakistan border. We visited the border for a “closing of the border ceremony” – probably the most lively nationalistic pep rally I’ve ever been to in my entire life. Before going, I thought this was a silly tourist thing, something like the British changing of the guard. I couldn’t have been more mistaken – the place was packed with hundreds of Indians in the stands, and across the border were the Pakistanis. There is a whole ceremony where the soldiers of each side try to “out stomp, out high-kick, and out yell” (lonely planet’s words. I confirmed it) meanwhile there is an Indian pep rally leader who tells people when to yell at the Pakistanis. It was pretty hilarious – I’ll attach a video.

Amritsar also has other cool temples that we visited. The Golden Temple is a highlight – they also offer a free meal to anyone at this temple (I do tend to think with my stomach). Check out the pictures – my description of the area won’t really do any justice (actually after looking at the pictures, they don’t do justice either).

For anyone that feels the urge to call me, my number here is +91 886 017 8325. For those of you in the USA, I got a local NY skype number that forwards to my phone here at no charge to you. The number is 646-257-2055.