Today, A Relaxing Morning and Why I Felt Like a Kid Again

Okay everyone, I've written some uplifting entries here as opposed to the usual discussions about poverty....hope you enjoy.

Like Tuesday, I also had today (Thursday) free for the holiday. The thing is, I didn’t know too many others who had today off, so I decided to have an “Anne day.” I slept in until 9.00, lounged around my flat and leisurely got dressed, went to the gym in Bandra, showered, and then flip-flopped across the street to a trendy little café where I sat and read this week’s TIME magazine nearly cover to cover.

I sat outside on the café’s patio in the shade of some palmy fronds (probably the only Western person who has done so in the history of the place….I despise air conditioning), ordered eggs Benedict, which I hadn’t eaten in about five years, and drank an iced latte blended to a frappe with a scoop of ice cream. Although I’d already had an amazing and relaxing morning, I decided to move on to get a facial at an acquaintance’s salon.

By mid-afternoon I was on my way back to my flat. I was just about to turn the corner inside my neighbourhood when I saw this little brown puppy coming up from behind me. Suddenly he became visibly happy: wagging his tail, running, and pouncing in my direction. But instead of running directly towards me he stopped and crawled under a car which sat parked between us. Confused, I tried to coax him out.

But then, as I squatted near the car, made some kissing noises and started speaking Swedish baby-talk to him, three little noses made their way towards my hand from the shade of the automobile. I had discovered three puppies, all apparently living under this car!



I think people had mistreated them, since they were a little frightened of me. But I coaxed them out, ran upstairs to get my camera and go through the fridge, came back and attempted to feed them last night’s leftovers, which they wouldn’t touch. It was difficult to get a shot of them all at once since they would not sit still.



But they were so playful and sweet, and reminded me what it must be like to have so much energy and see the world through such fresh eyes. I was happy to have discovered them, I suppose, because I think it’s the first time I’ve seen puppies since… I cannot remember. (I tried not to think about that they were probably rabid and carrying lots of unique diseases…just avoided getting my hands or body too close….)



As I watched them at play I thought about how to a puppy, a new day is a big adventure. They discover new things and play and experience life to its fullest. I thought, that’s how I should experience life here in India (figuratively, of course)…tumbling around, running up to new things, chasing after things that interest me, sniffing around for good stuff and barking up trees after the bandicoot.



In retrospect, perhaps the puppies taught me a lesson. Perhaps I shouldn’t focus so much on my work and on the poverty in India, but make more time for my own happiness. Here, for 15 minutes, I got to feel like a kid again: laughing and playing on the lawn with these curious little creatures.



N.B. This version is a draft…my computer crashed and did not save the better version…will be reworked next week

Diwali: A Couple of Days Spent Relaxing and in the Hawking Zone of Colaba

Everywhere in Mumbai, it’s evident that Diwali is in full force. Many thresholds are decorated with the tell-tale colours and symbols of holiday festivities.





Even the Taj President Hotel is lit up by night in a Pepto-Bismol shade of fuchsia.



Like most Indians we had Tuesday off for Diwali, so my two roommates and I took the Hindu holiday to visit a Muslim mosque. On the way to the train station, we were greeted by street kids who were happy to speak a little English with us. Eating popsicles and armed with orange plastic guns, they posed for a shot in front of a bus stop near Mahim Station.



Although it was sweltering and upwards of 34 degrees C, I was glad to finally get the opportunity to visit Haji Ali, one of Mumbai’s oldest mosques right on the sea.
The mosque is like something out of a movie. (Actually, Bollywood often opens some of its films with Haji Ali in the backdrop.)

No photos were allowed inside the mosque, so I just have this one of me with Annika as we covered our hair prior to entering. Shivapriya had already made her way into the mosque. This pic makes me laugh.



Later that night I met up with Avantika and her landlord, who is a member at the exclusive President Radio Club in Colaba and who invited us to join her and her family for dinner. The food was fabulous, and so were the fireworks.



On the way home I took some long exposure shots to show the hot night, Churchgate Station at 10 p.m. from inside my train car, and a view from the train window out into Mumbai from where I sat, first class men’s compartment, more for safety than out of loneliness.

A Typical Morning on My Way to Work

It’s Diwali, or the Festival of Lights: probably the biggest Indian holiday. Monday on my way to work I snapped some shots of what’s going on around here in Mahim and then later in Cotton Green, near where I get off the train to walk to my ofc…pretty typical, actually, and not much out of the ordinary.



Due to the holiday, there are lanterns everywhere. I saw this mammoth lantern being constructed on the street by the bamboo weavers a week ago.

The post office in Mahim is usually dead. Today, the one day I needed to mail two letters, it was swamped. Typical.



Walking towards the train, I usually pass a little diner, I guess you could call it, or in Swedish gatukök (street kitchen). There, a shopkeeper sets out his little fried treats, which I think are “pure veg.”



Then, a little further down my street, there’s the man who prepares his pile of coconuts for the day. Today he wielded his machete with as much style and grace as usual, and if I had more time I’d like to just park on the sidewalk and film him on my little Pentax.



I’m going to have to sample one of those coconuts someday soon. My friend Pradnya has a mom who is a doctor and warned me when they were visiting: “Whatever you do, you MUST NOT drink from those street vendors’ straws: they reuse them. You’ll get Hep B!” From one extreme germaphobe to another, that was an effective warning.



Getting off the train and walking to work I pass two lazy bulls every morning. They are constantly eating sugar cane and enjoying their status in Indian society. Since it’s a holiday this week, they had extra cane on the cart that morning. Lucky for them, life is sweet.

How I Managed to Get Online: A Saga Shortened to Four Pghs

Little did I know the ways in which accessing the internet (something that shouldn’t be hard to do in a land of tekkies) could be so time-consuming, flabbergasting, and outright ridiculous. It took me nearly eight weeks: Yes. Eight Weeks to have access to and communicate with my people out there in the world. And you can imagine that, since I’m such a net junkie, that this was not an easy period for me. It was probably also one of the reasons I had a mini-breakdown.



I started to write all of it down here but then realised it would bore everyone to tears. So to summarise: It took eight weeks. It involved men visiting with paperwork, and then visiting separately to install the wires from the rooftop. It involved calling a supervisor 30 to 40 times to get a technician back here to finish the installation. And when he came, I couldn’t believe it.



In the photo you see various wires. As I watched from my balcony, one guy on my rooftop threw a cable to a guy onto the building next to mine, who threw the cable onto building #18 (two buildings from mine). Then he just yelled down to me, ‘okay, we’re going to lower the cable to your balcony. Just grab it and pull it in !’ They lowered the cable, slowly, swaying it back and forth so that it brushed against the metal cage that surrounds my balcony, allowing me to grab it. I pulled in the wire, he came downstairs, fished it through the doors, and voila! Finito.



This is India. This is how things are done. So now I have a cable just hanging from the rooftop of my building, three stories up, to my balcony, and coming in through my French doors. Too funny! One final note: as I write this, I’m having trouble with my connection. I called them four days ago but because of the Diwali holidays, they haven’t yet sent someone out. Hope this is resolved soon.

A Good Day at Work

One day at work was particularly nice: it was a Friday, and my birthday at that. The kids were waiting for me, quietly (a rare surprise), and all yelled out in unison upon my arrival: “HAPPY BIRTHDAY, ANNE DIDI!” Needless to say I was pleased. These guys are only 14 years old…that’s quite an accomplishment. I praised them promptly and took their photo.



One of the perks about work is that I, like most Indians, get to run around barefoot when the environment allows. The weather is beautiful, the kids are sitting in a circle, I’m just listening to their discussion about the literature and guiding it, and we’re all barefoot. I would be such a hippie, if only I liked patchouli, marijuana and tye-dyed garb.

I Walked in the Name of Gandhiji

October 2nd is Gandhi’s birthday, and a national holiday here. Many Indians slept in and ate a leisurely breakfast. But about 250 fellow employees, teachers, social workers, volunteers and students went on a walk throughout the slums of Mumbai in Gandhi’s name, and I was one of them. The idea was to go out into low-income and impoverished neighbourhoods and connect with people. From the photos, you can get an idea of how we interacted through some art activities and discussions.






Personally I had looked forward to going into Dharuvi (Asia’s biggest slum, here in Mumbai) to connect with people, mainly children. The idea was to do something positive in the name of Gandhi on his birthday: to be the change we want to see in the world.





But when the day came, I got up at 7 a.m. and cursed myself for agreeing to go through with the walk for two selfish reasons: because I hadn't slept enough, and because I was slightly hung over. I skipped breakfast, water, and brushing my teeth to get to the train on time. After meeting in a central location, all 250 of us separated into groups and set out for different quarters of the city (my group had been slated for Dharuvi). We traveled by bus and walked for some time, until at last our group entered the community. It was then that I began to feel some nuances of trepidation and a little anxiety.

Although I was smiling and distributing candies and stickers and pencils and crayons to children, inside I was a scared child, afraid of poverty, the choice I'd made to come to this seemingly backwards country, and the masses of people around me crammed into those small and tattered living quarters. Within minutes, I had distributed the things to the swarming children. Eventually my fear gave way to a positive energy that came not only from the kind gestures and words from the people of this neighborhood but from my inspiring colleagues who took time to hold children, talk to the people, shake hands and instruct (in hindi, of course. i couldn't do as much as a bystander although i did play with the children. It was a photo op sans Obama, a Big Mac without Clinton on his campaign trail. Although unseen to the world, a few these moments were perhaps the most inspiring I'd felt all year.




Once I began to feel comfortable about being there I remembered why I chose to come here for this job. I have been in the slums here before with my students, and was reminded that fifty percent of Mumbai’s residents live in similar conditions. Despite such circumstances, I found that the people of Dharuvi were in very high spirits: smiling, laughing, greeting us on a holiday. Children drew happily with the pens and crayons and paper that we distributed. They participated in a contest for prizes; they comically posed for photos and ran back to me to see the digital image; they danced and played around us, happy with the presence of strangers, simple stickers and balloons. Once again, I felt that train wreck collision of two worlds in my heart and was reminded that humility is precious.





The point here from my perspective was not to “save” the people from themselves, or enlighten or bring some kind of band-aid solution to the kids and their problems, but just to interact and understand and perhaps share a smile and a few words of Hindi or English with some fellow Mumbaikars for five minutes. It was a snapshot of life. By no means did I feel heroic or as if I was acting out of salvation. It was just a nice experience, to choose to spend a morning in a place that I’d otherwise not likely be, trying for a moment to "be the change," although I don't know how much we changed anything, but for making 45 kids smile and laugh for a few minutes ... in the name of India's fearless and legendary leader who owned nothing more than what he carried with him.





It isn’t really appropriate or justifiable to compare Sweden or the US to India for many reasons, but as I stood there surrounded by so many enthusiastic kids I remembered many of my American and international students in Göteborg, Trollhättan and Grand Haven who had everything yet were the most unhappy people in the world. A significant percentage of my high school students, esp. in the US, demonstrated negative attitudes in the classroom about school (that it "sucked," for ex) and/or were on anti-depressants and struggling through a lot of "problems," yes, BIG problems, stemming from too many choices in a society that offers too much.

Here, by contrast, children here today demonstrated so much gratitude in receiving simple gifts of pencils and paper. These children, who have no toys but for makeshift kites assembled with plastic and twine, greeted us only with warmth and smiles. I wondered for a moment about these two types of classrooms, feeling more like a student in the classroom of Dharuvi, and acknowledging a simple revelation that I had chosen this path that has become my life.

My Struggle with the Idea of Status

It’s pretty hard to accept that status is such a big deal in this place. I think it's the worst thing about living here: people want to flaunt their status. It’s not like you can be working class or a pink collar teacher and be proud of it, go out to the pub with friends, discuss the world’s problems over a few pints and go home. Here, to go out for drinks (or at least seek psychotherapy through friendly banter at the pub), you almost need to be rich, because alcohol costs too much. Oh, and there are no pubs. There are places like Hard Rock Café, where waiters and clientele get up on the tables to dance to ACDC. It’s just hard to find a nice, quiet, dark pub. In fact, I haven’t found one yet. The closest thing to it is Jeffrey’s, an Australian pub…but the noise and music (and the quintessential and annoying “Man from Down Under” song in Aussie pubs) just gets on my nerves, as does the crowd.





One acquaintance of mine comes from a lot of money. Her diamond engagement ring is one of the biggest I've ever seen. One evening while we were riding in a cab together, I mentioned that there is no drinking culture in India... to which she responded: “Oh, a lot of people drink here after work!” but the thing is, it’s just her crowd who is drinking (mainly the rich). Those are the people who go to the country club and horse races.

Interestingly, I’m caught in the middle of the status strata since I’m an expat in this country and everyone believes I have a lot of money to throw around. If I go out, of course there is only a certain number of places that offer, for example, beer or Chinese food or bottled water. By default I am grouped with a class of people I wouldn’t normally associate with. Additionally I’m fair so that automatically places me into a “respected” category, like a higher caste. It's really, really sick.






But back to the taxi conversation regarding one acquaintance's comment about drinking culture. When this woman told me about her experiences studying in the U.S., she mentioned that Americans could learn a lot from Indians. I, of course, was interested in hearing more because I am very keen on cultural understanding and obviously understanding this culture. The reason, she answered, was that Americans need more spare time to enjoy life, and not work so much. Indians have so much time to socialise, she said, because all their cooking, cleaning, and dirty work is done for them…so they are able to enjoy life to the fullest.


Her ideas perplexed me mainly because she fails to see that her crowd comprises only a few percent of this city's population.... though if I had come from her background perhaps I could perhaps see her point. The thing was, there were people in the car whose parents or families were those workers. So I just told her that the biggest difference, perhaps, is that a lot of Americans (or Swedes, even more) take pride in their work…and that includes washing your car on Sundays, ironing one’s own shirts, and the act of taking a scrub brush to our toilets. It’s not a big deal, and we do not believe we are above those tasks, which are considered remedial here.





All I can say is that I really miss going out with my fellow colleagues for a beer on Fridays to discuss the workweek and how we can create change in the schools where we work. Here, going out for a beer is more of an expensive privilege and it includes hanging out with people who encourage discussing a lot of corporate bullshit. I know I was constantly annoyed by Swedish culture, but there is something to be said about a society in which almost everyone can enjoy the same privileges. Here …this idea is as foreign as much as absolutely impossible.

It’s still a pretty incredible idea to me that I am wining and dining with the privileged by night, some of who are the wealthiest people in the city, and then spending hours by day with the poorest children. My life has become this: two extremes, in every respect. The mediocrity and idea of “lagom” in Sweden is definitely gone now…it’s either everything or nothing now.