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It's Good to be back. A month away in exotic places having new adventures was wonderfully refreshing, but it's even better to be home again, among people I love and seeing everything I care about in a new light.
Having both parents waiting for me at the arrival hall was just the start of some rare family time - especially apt because it was the baby brother's birthday. I can't believe he's 23 already! Wasn't I just there? Coincidentally his university choir concert was that night, and the parents and I were quite surprised (but immensely proud) to see his face smiling out at us from the programme booklet as we walked into the concert hall - we had no idea that he was the concert chairperson. Isn't it horrible that you can be family and yet know so little about each other's lives? But this weekend we started to make a dent in that.
Unemployment has not been as indulgent as I thought - I've been filling the hours productively learning grammar rules, proof reading law articles (gotta earn my keep somehow!), sorting out my future employment - and going back to ai/dh/a. That last has been welcome - I had really missed people and it was so nice to see them again - but also intense - certain things do not change overnight, and the work itself (that I was drafted into immediately due to a shortage of mentor buddies!) is quite draining. Deciding how to pick things back up has been quite an eye-opener in itself. I had some edifying conversations with fellow volunteers tonight that made me realise that after all it's up to you to work with what you have and create your own opportunities. I'm so grateful to have friends to seek advice from and work in solidarity with. Here's to wiser new beginnings!
But really, all this is such a distraction from the real work. In trying to place Christ at the centre in prayer tonight, I suddenly remembered a small incident from Sunday: I was helping a student go through the belief change cycle exercise on the first day of her course, and at the end of the simple 5 minute walk, she had tears in her eyes. She said she had never had the chance to tell anyone what she felt before.
It's for moments like this that we work; if only we could remember always to place God's life-giving work at the centre!
Having both parents waiting for me at the arrival hall was just the start of some rare family time - especially apt because it was the baby brother's birthday. I can't believe he's 23 already! Wasn't I just there? Coincidentally his university choir concert was that night, and the parents and I were quite surprised (but immensely proud) to see his face smiling out at us from the programme booklet as we walked into the concert hall - we had no idea that he was the concert chairperson. Isn't it horrible that you can be family and yet know so little about each other's lives? But this weekend we started to make a dent in that.
Unemployment has not been as indulgent as I thought - I've been filling the hours productively learning grammar rules, proof reading law articles (gotta earn my keep somehow!), sorting out my future employment - and going back to ai/dh/a. That last has been welcome - I had really missed people and it was so nice to see them again - but also intense - certain things do not change overnight, and the work itself (that I was drafted into immediately due to a shortage of mentor buddies!) is quite draining. Deciding how to pick things back up has been quite an eye-opener in itself. I had some edifying conversations with fellow volunteers tonight that made me realise that after all it's up to you to work with what you have and create your own opportunities. I'm so grateful to have friends to seek advice from and work in solidarity with. Here's to wiser new beginnings!
But really, all this is such a distraction from the real work. In trying to place Christ at the centre in prayer tonight, I suddenly remembered a small incident from Sunday: I was helping a student go through the belief change cycle exercise on the first day of her course, and at the end of the simple 5 minute walk, she had tears in her eyes. She said she had never had the chance to tell anyone what she felt before.
It's for moments like this that we work; if only we could remember always to place God's life-giving work at the centre!
So, am back in Delhi. Gosh we just had such a scare when my companion fell quite ill from not eating enough (we were on the train for 8 hours and then stuck in a traffic jam later), and i felt quite bad that I didn't notice it earlier. Anyway, thankfully he's recovered after taking in some food and seems to be bouncing back. People expect to get ill in India, but I don't think we were expecting it in this particular way!
I'm quite looking forward to going home now. It's been a great month, but it will be so nice to be back engaging in familiar pursuits and meeting people I've missed. There's just the Taj Mahal and Old Delhi left to see - won't that be an end with a bang?
Delhi looks very modern after Kolkata and Amritsar. We spent 3 days in Calcutta (I much prefer this old fashioned spelling) taking in the feel of the city - people say Calcutta is a city you feel, rather than see the monuments of, and they are completely right. It was a city quite unlike any I've ever seen (no thoughts of "this could be thailand / Philippines / Indonesia" crossed the mind at all). Everywhere you looked there were people, cars, rickshaws (autos, cycles and pulled - Calcutta is apparently the last bastion in India of the pulled rickshaw) and the occasional herd of goats. People were engaged in all types of pursuits - from carrying large loads to defecating by the roadside to bathing from roadside wells. We visited different markets for fruits, flowers, books and - very uniquely - statues of goddesses (they lower these into the river Hooghly at festival times). To this mix, just add in grubby dilapidated buildings (rent controls are strict so that the poor can afford housing, but this gives landlords little incentive to maintain their property), smog in the air (I was told they burn garbage so that the smoke will keep mosquitoes away), and the all-pervasive heat - and you get an idea of what calcutta is like on the surface. (I thought Rohini was exaggerating when she said I'd have to get used to the humidity in Calcutta - how much more humid than Singapore can one get? - but she was absolutely right.)
The impression one gets of too many people squeezed together is amplified by the narrowness of the roads, the incessant honking from cars, and the general dirt that coats everything in sight. Still, there is a particular charm of the place - some leftover romance, perhaps - that gives the city a feel you'll not get anywhere else. Of course, to feel this you have to come to terms with the in-your-face poverty that makes one wonder why Calcutta is the "city of joy".
After Calcutta we flew to Amritsar to visit the Golden Temple and see the wagah border retreat ceremony. In the jalanwalah bagh of Amritsar we discovered relics of a massacre carried out by British soldiers on unarmed protesters - in Calcutta too there were monuments to Bengali resistance against the occupiers - that made me wonder about the courage ordinary people have to stand up against oppression. I remember reading the story of a recent defector from the Syrian armed forces, recounting being forced to shoot into crowds of unarmed civilians and having to run because he could not do it. How do we all do such things to ourselves?
I suppose an understanding of human behaviour must start from the self and in everyday interactions. I had another little epiphany of sorts while standing in front of Mother Teresa's tomb in Calcutta. I went there without any expectations - in fact, after hearing about different friends' experiences there I thought I would be quite jaded - but seeing the flower petals strewn on the stone, forming the words "love until it hurts", was profoundly moving. I found myself holding back tears.
Mother Teresa's story perhaps is one of small things that turned into something huge. To do small things with great love was the motto she took from her namesake saint. Coincidentally (if one still believes in coincidences), the day's old testament reading was about turning hearts of stone into living hearts - and I read a related commentary citing pope John Paul II's exhortation to charity workers to go beyond the form and give from hearts that love because they are loved by God. Mother Teresa's mission was not just to give material support - it was to bring God into people's lives - and that must be mine also. More and more I'm realising how I've been doing for the sake of doing what I thought was God's will without searching for the deeper purpose behind the actions - and how that brings a fatal mix of pride and selfishness into the work that makes it impossible to come to fruition.
Since that first realisation, I started to notice small things I do out of selfish reasons; small contradictions - like buying a new dress but not giving to beggars on the street (why is one expenditure more justified than another?); feeling resentful at having to move my luggage for someone else on the train when just two weeks ago i was so grateful at someone sharing food with me on my first train journey; or even feeling irritated at my companion before I realised that he was actually feeling quite ill. It's probably the gazillionth time I'm realising that I need to start from small things - but God never quite gives up on us even when he should, does he? I wish I could be like the two Teresa's who promised not to say no to God for anything. But it takes small steps!
I'm quite looking forward to going home now. It's been a great month, but it will be so nice to be back engaging in familiar pursuits and meeting people I've missed. There's just the Taj Mahal and Old Delhi left to see - won't that be an end with a bang?
Delhi looks very modern after Kolkata and Amritsar. We spent 3 days in Calcutta (I much prefer this old fashioned spelling) taking in the feel of the city - people say Calcutta is a city you feel, rather than see the monuments of, and they are completely right. It was a city quite unlike any I've ever seen (no thoughts of "this could be thailand / Philippines / Indonesia" crossed the mind at all). Everywhere you looked there were people, cars, rickshaws (autos, cycles and pulled - Calcutta is apparently the last bastion in India of the pulled rickshaw) and the occasional herd of goats. People were engaged in all types of pursuits - from carrying large loads to defecating by the roadside to bathing from roadside wells. We visited different markets for fruits, flowers, books and - very uniquely - statues of goddesses (they lower these into the river Hooghly at festival times). To this mix, just add in grubby dilapidated buildings (rent controls are strict so that the poor can afford housing, but this gives landlords little incentive to maintain their property), smog in the air (I was told they burn garbage so that the smoke will keep mosquitoes away), and the all-pervasive heat - and you get an idea of what calcutta is like on the surface. (I thought Rohini was exaggerating when she said I'd have to get used to the humidity in Calcutta - how much more humid than Singapore can one get? - but she was absolutely right.)
The impression one gets of too many people squeezed together is amplified by the narrowness of the roads, the incessant honking from cars, and the general dirt that coats everything in sight. Still, there is a particular charm of the place - some leftover romance, perhaps - that gives the city a feel you'll not get anywhere else. Of course, to feel this you have to come to terms with the in-your-face poverty that makes one wonder why Calcutta is the "city of joy".
After Calcutta we flew to Amritsar to visit the Golden Temple and see the wagah border retreat ceremony. In the jalanwalah bagh of Amritsar we discovered relics of a massacre carried out by British soldiers on unarmed protesters - in Calcutta too there were monuments to Bengali resistance against the occupiers - that made me wonder about the courage ordinary people have to stand up against oppression. I remember reading the story of a recent defector from the Syrian armed forces, recounting being forced to shoot into crowds of unarmed civilians and having to run because he could not do it. How do we all do such things to ourselves?
I suppose an understanding of human behaviour must start from the self and in everyday interactions. I had another little epiphany of sorts while standing in front of Mother Teresa's tomb in Calcutta. I went there without any expectations - in fact, after hearing about different friends' experiences there I thought I would be quite jaded - but seeing the flower petals strewn on the stone, forming the words "love until it hurts", was profoundly moving. I found myself holding back tears.
Mother Teresa's story perhaps is one of small things that turned into something huge. To do small things with great love was the motto she took from her namesake saint. Coincidentally (if one still believes in coincidences), the day's old testament reading was about turning hearts of stone into living hearts - and I read a related commentary citing pope John Paul II's exhortation to charity workers to go beyond the form and give from hearts that love because they are loved by God. Mother Teresa's mission was not just to give material support - it was to bring God into people's lives - and that must be mine also. More and more I'm realising how I've been doing for the sake of doing what I thought was God's will without searching for the deeper purpose behind the actions - and how that brings a fatal mix of pride and selfishness into the work that makes it impossible to come to fruition.
Since that first realisation, I started to notice small things I do out of selfish reasons; small contradictions - like buying a new dress but not giving to beggars on the street (why is one expenditure more justified than another?); feeling resentful at having to move my luggage for someone else on the train when just two weeks ago i was so grateful at someone sharing food with me on my first train journey; or even feeling irritated at my companion before I realised that he was actually feeling quite ill. It's probably the gazillionth time I'm realising that I need to start from small things - but God never quite gives up on us even when he should, does he? I wish I could be like the two Teresa's who promised not to say no to God for anything. But it takes small steps!
Dubai has just passed in a flash and I haven't had time to sit and write anything, but am now at the airport waiting for my flight and the girl I came with from italy just went through her boarding gate.
It's been a really interesting week - a drastic swing from my needing to talk to wanting to be alone again! The weekend started on Friday (that in itself was weird - people start their work week on Sunday) and I ventured out in the morning to take a look at the city. Just 10 minutes later I realised that was a very bad idea - there were no pavements to walk on (you either walk on the road or on the sand) and despite the early hour it was HOT! I came across some of the closed bus stops that they have that are supposed to be air conditioned but these weren't - perhaps because it was still the last days of their "winter". It was interesting to see how the climate affects people's way of living. Dubai really is a city I'm the desert - for most of the week it was very dusty and you couldn't see far because of the sand in the air (but the sand was very fine, so unlike in Rajasthan you couldn't feel that you were breathing it in). M said that people just don't walk in Dubai, which explains the absence of pavements - they drive everywhere probably because oil is plentiful and the weather is bad - and so the girls at the college were not used to exertion and would circle around the parking lot to find spaces near the doors.
But I'm getting ahead of things. After that failed excursion I made it to the college and it was great to see S and M and T again. The campus was beautiful - the lawns and brightly coloured flowers were well kept and the buildings looked so crisp and new (later I learnt that they were more than 20 years old but done up every 5 years) - and a-I-d)ha Dubai had been given a beautiful big wing of the business school for office and classroom use. (I felt quite jealous.) we spent the next two days there with me bringing the Dubai ladies through our materials and operations from the Singapore campus. It's really exciting for them to be able to start building a campus from scratch - and I was impressed at how M had thought things through, made adaptations that will suit their resources here and eliminate lots of the hassle we go through in Singapore, and chose not to start till all the pieces are in place. It's still a learning experience for me to see how everyone who comes to A puts in their own styles and experience to come up with ways of getting things done that are so different!
At the end of the second day, M drove me across town to a Catholic church in Jebel Ali. That drive was one of the highlights of my week - that day was still clear, and offered great views of the magnificent roads and skyscrapers. Dubai at first glance looks like Disneyland - all the buildings new and sparkling and gosh you didn't know that there were so many innovatively-designed skyscrapers in the world. (But after I'd seen more of it - and I crossed sheikh zayed road so many times subsequently on buses and metro - it looked less stunning and you could see some of the usual signs of cities fraying at the edges (e.g. certain buildings looking run down and the desert claiming back other spots).) we finally found the church in a cluster of other religious institutions - the was a gurdwara and a Syrian orthodox church and a bible something church etc. ("something for everyone," M said).
It was my first time in church since starting off on the trip - I had not felt comfortable going to look for a church in India. The congregation was a very international mix and it was nice to be back in familiar surroundings. As part of their Lenten petitions, they prayed for people who were avoiding going for confession because of fear or laziness - and on hearing THAT I was quite embarrassed. It was certainly God's prompting - on hearing that I also realised that I really needed to unburden myself of all the negatives I'd been carrying for the past few months. I'd not thought about things for the first two weeks in India before my desert nightmare, but since then - and especially after talking to T - they were coming back to mind. So I went for confession after the mass - and it was a beautiful experience. It was so good to finally tell things and seek absolution - even though I thought I'd been talking to God in prayer, it was still very different to go through the physical act of telling the priest as his proxy - and after a good cry I came out feeling whole and healed again. What can I say but that God always knows best and loves unconditionally? :)
On Sunday the conference started at the college and took over life for a week - there was such a packed schedule. The idea behind the conference was to bring together young women from all over the world and pair them up with emirati students from the college to promote inter cultural exchange and talk about social issues. Along with sessions in the college, though, there were also sightseeing excursions to the burj khalifa and the federal national council and grand mosque in Abu dhabi. The mosque was wonderful - I love the geometric shapes that seem to be the core of Islamic architectural design - and in this particular mosque the basic unit was always flowers. We had to wear abayas (long black outer dress) and shaylas (head veil) in the mosque, which was also an experience. Most emirati women wear both when they go out or are in the presence of males not in the family, and now new fashions have come up - there are closed abayas and open ones that have slits at the bottom showing what you are wearing inside, and then there embroidered ones and some with colours on the hems or coloured patterns on the body. Very few of the college girls wore the full headgear that leaves nothing showing but the eyes - but I did see quite a few women wearing those on the metro.
(I digress here, but the Dubai metro is seriously the best metro system I've come across in any country. The first time I took it, I actually felt jealous. But it was strange that everyone on the metro (and in most public places) were not emirati - depending on where you looked, you could have been somewhere on the Indian subcontinent, in the Philippines, or in Europe. 80% of the population in Dubai is made up of migrants. I was hoping to learn more about how this is affecting the social fabric, but the only impressions I got were that locals felt quite protective of their culture against outside influences (one of the girls said that lots of things were permitted for the sake of encouraging tourism in Dubai though the otherwise would not have been) and that the government is trying to preserve the separate-ness of locals by building houses and encouraging them to stay in them while apartments would be for expatriates. From what I hear, the government also offers a strong safety net for locals, with subsidies for everything from land to education to weddings.)
Back to the narrative - on the whole I enjoyed visited places and learning more about new cultures (not just from the emiratis but also the other women) but didn't like the feeling of being back in university orientation camp (for reasons of both personality and age!). The desert safari was certainly a highlight - we drove into the dunes one evening, which looked very different from the thar desert in jaisalmer. The sand was light red and fine (apparently all the emirates have differently coloured sand) and I now know why people use the term "dune seas" - those dunes stretched as far as the eye could see in any direction! And we tried sandboarding - like snow boarding but on sand, and a lot easier - it was a lot of fun. There was Arabic coffee and dates (used in welcoming guests) and a falcon and lots and lots of food - they were making shawarmas and bread and falafel from scratch there!
N and I had come on the early car and so decided to leave early too before the dancing - I'm not partial to dancing and really wanted to do more sightseeing. (I heard the dancing was quite something, though. All the men left on the early car with us so the women could take off their abayas. The college had brought out some police patrols to chase men away from the camp - apparently in previous years, because the camp was set in a depression among the dunes, local emirati men would get word that there was a group of girls partying in the camp and drive out in droves in their desert buggies to watch from atop the surrounding dunes!) So N and I took the metro across town to Dubai marina. By the time we got there it was late and we couldn't see the palm beach, but did step onto the cold sands of the marina and take a walk on JBR walk. This was evidently a late night hanging out spot - despite the hour there were crowds of young people, older people, families, locals and expatriates lounging about in restaurants or walking along the small outdoor shops. Along the seafront was a veritable jungle of high rise apartments and hotels, simply exuding luxury - how nice it would be to live somewhere like that!
Not that I'm not enjoying luxury. The accommodation and food at the conference has been nothing short of stunning - each buffet is more astonishing than the last, and the chocolate mousse at last night's dhow cruise was about the nicest dessert I have ever eaten. I might have lost some weight in India, might definitely have put it (and more) back on!
P.S. yet another highlight of Dubai was meeting up with Karishma K on the weekend. I couldn't believe she had just arrived in Dubai too. We've now met in two countries, none of which were our own!
It's been a really interesting week - a drastic swing from my needing to talk to wanting to be alone again! The weekend started on Friday (that in itself was weird - people start their work week on Sunday) and I ventured out in the morning to take a look at the city. Just 10 minutes later I realised that was a very bad idea - there were no pavements to walk on (you either walk on the road or on the sand) and despite the early hour it was HOT! I came across some of the closed bus stops that they have that are supposed to be air conditioned but these weren't - perhaps because it was still the last days of their "winter". It was interesting to see how the climate affects people's way of living. Dubai really is a city I'm the desert - for most of the week it was very dusty and you couldn't see far because of the sand in the air (but the sand was very fine, so unlike in Rajasthan you couldn't feel that you were breathing it in). M said that people just don't walk in Dubai, which explains the absence of pavements - they drive everywhere probably because oil is plentiful and the weather is bad - and so the girls at the college were not used to exertion and would circle around the parking lot to find spaces near the doors.
But I'm getting ahead of things. After that failed excursion I made it to the college and it was great to see S and M and T again. The campus was beautiful - the lawns and brightly coloured flowers were well kept and the buildings looked so crisp and new (later I learnt that they were more than 20 years old but done up every 5 years) - and a-I-d)ha Dubai had been given a beautiful big wing of the business school for office and classroom use. (I felt quite jealous.) we spent the next two days there with me bringing the Dubai ladies through our materials and operations from the Singapore campus. It's really exciting for them to be able to start building a campus from scratch - and I was impressed at how M had thought things through, made adaptations that will suit their resources here and eliminate lots of the hassle we go through in Singapore, and chose not to start till all the pieces are in place. It's still a learning experience for me to see how everyone who comes to A puts in their own styles and experience to come up with ways of getting things done that are so different!
At the end of the second day, M drove me across town to a Catholic church in Jebel Ali. That drive was one of the highlights of my week - that day was still clear, and offered great views of the magnificent roads and skyscrapers. Dubai at first glance looks like Disneyland - all the buildings new and sparkling and gosh you didn't know that there were so many innovatively-designed skyscrapers in the world. (But after I'd seen more of it - and I crossed sheikh zayed road so many times subsequently on buses and metro - it looked less stunning and you could see some of the usual signs of cities fraying at the edges (e.g. certain buildings looking run down and the desert claiming back other spots).) we finally found the church in a cluster of other religious institutions - the was a gurdwara and a Syrian orthodox church and a bible something church etc. ("something for everyone," M said).
It was my first time in church since starting off on the trip - I had not felt comfortable going to look for a church in India. The congregation was a very international mix and it was nice to be back in familiar surroundings. As part of their Lenten petitions, they prayed for people who were avoiding going for confession because of fear or laziness - and on hearing THAT I was quite embarrassed. It was certainly God's prompting - on hearing that I also realised that I really needed to unburden myself of all the negatives I'd been carrying for the past few months. I'd not thought about things for the first two weeks in India before my desert nightmare, but since then - and especially after talking to T - they were coming back to mind. So I went for confession after the mass - and it was a beautiful experience. It was so good to finally tell things and seek absolution - even though I thought I'd been talking to God in prayer, it was still very different to go through the physical act of telling the priest as his proxy - and after a good cry I came out feeling whole and healed again. What can I say but that God always knows best and loves unconditionally? :)
On Sunday the conference started at the college and took over life for a week - there was such a packed schedule. The idea behind the conference was to bring together young women from all over the world and pair them up with emirati students from the college to promote inter cultural exchange and talk about social issues. Along with sessions in the college, though, there were also sightseeing excursions to the burj khalifa and the federal national council and grand mosque in Abu dhabi. The mosque was wonderful - I love the geometric shapes that seem to be the core of Islamic architectural design - and in this particular mosque the basic unit was always flowers. We had to wear abayas (long black outer dress) and shaylas (head veil) in the mosque, which was also an experience. Most emirati women wear both when they go out or are in the presence of males not in the family, and now new fashions have come up - there are closed abayas and open ones that have slits at the bottom showing what you are wearing inside, and then there embroidered ones and some with colours on the hems or coloured patterns on the body. Very few of the college girls wore the full headgear that leaves nothing showing but the eyes - but I did see quite a few women wearing those on the metro.
(I digress here, but the Dubai metro is seriously the best metro system I've come across in any country. The first time I took it, I actually felt jealous. But it was strange that everyone on the metro (and in most public places) were not emirati - depending on where you looked, you could have been somewhere on the Indian subcontinent, in the Philippines, or in Europe. 80% of the population in Dubai is made up of migrants. I was hoping to learn more about how this is affecting the social fabric, but the only impressions I got were that locals felt quite protective of their culture against outside influences (one of the girls said that lots of things were permitted for the sake of encouraging tourism in Dubai though the otherwise would not have been) and that the government is trying to preserve the separate-ness of locals by building houses and encouraging them to stay in them while apartments would be for expatriates. From what I hear, the government also offers a strong safety net for locals, with subsidies for everything from land to education to weddings.)
Back to the narrative - on the whole I enjoyed visited places and learning more about new cultures (not just from the emiratis but also the other women) but didn't like the feeling of being back in university orientation camp (for reasons of both personality and age!). The desert safari was certainly a highlight - we drove into the dunes one evening, which looked very different from the thar desert in jaisalmer. The sand was light red and fine (apparently all the emirates have differently coloured sand) and I now know why people use the term "dune seas" - those dunes stretched as far as the eye could see in any direction! And we tried sandboarding - like snow boarding but on sand, and a lot easier - it was a lot of fun. There was Arabic coffee and dates (used in welcoming guests) and a falcon and lots and lots of food - they were making shawarmas and bread and falafel from scratch there!
N and I had come on the early car and so decided to leave early too before the dancing - I'm not partial to dancing and really wanted to do more sightseeing. (I heard the dancing was quite something, though. All the men left on the early car with us so the women could take off their abayas. The college had brought out some police patrols to chase men away from the camp - apparently in previous years, because the camp was set in a depression among the dunes, local emirati men would get word that there was a group of girls partying in the camp and drive out in droves in their desert buggies to watch from atop the surrounding dunes!) So N and I took the metro across town to Dubai marina. By the time we got there it was late and we couldn't see the palm beach, but did step onto the cold sands of the marina and take a walk on JBR walk. This was evidently a late night hanging out spot - despite the hour there were crowds of young people, older people, families, locals and expatriates lounging about in restaurants or walking along the small outdoor shops. Along the seafront was a veritable jungle of high rise apartments and hotels, simply exuding luxury - how nice it would be to live somewhere like that!
Not that I'm not enjoying luxury. The accommodation and food at the conference has been nothing short of stunning - each buffet is more astonishing than the last, and the chocolate mousse at last night's dhow cruise was about the nicest dessert I have ever eaten. I might have lost some weight in India, might definitely have put it (and more) back on!
P.S. yet another highlight of Dubai was meeting up with Karishma K on the weekend. I couldn't believe she had just arrived in Dubai too. We've now met in two countries, none of which were our own!
It's a beautiful windy and sunshiny day and I've settled down on the grass next to mahatma gandhi's cremation spot. There are lines of visitors walking around the hill to "pay homage" to the great spirit, but the site itself is simply adorned and surrounded by a green, peaceful park where people are just ramming about. Certainly a congested haven in delhi.
Gandhi would definitely appreciate the simplicity of his memorial compared to some of the kings of ages past. I visited humayun's tomb yesterday after recuperating from the long train journey and the instructional exhibit showed the silhouettes of emperors and shahs of the subcontinent and persia - gosh were they elaborate. But none so elaborate as humayun's tomb itself. Stepping into the stone archway through which you see the tomb for the first time, I was quite awestruck - the irreverent "Oh my God" was all that crossed my mind for a few seconds. And this wasn't even the Taj!
The garden surrounding the tomb was peaceful and green too - and it had fountains and water channels crossing the garden perpendicularly in a way that represented the 4 streams mentioned in the Koran. This must be the metaphorical equivalent of the steams that watered the garden of Eden in genesis - which, interestingly, I just learnt represent the 4 great rivers in the middle east!
Humayun's tomb was apparently Shah Jahan's inspiration for the Taj. I've heard from two other travellers so far that visiting the Taj - despite its hype and commercialisation - is one of the most amazing experiences they've had in India. This morning at breakfast an American couple who'd spent two months in India affirmed its wonders - and I have been idly speculating if I was be any less awed having seen humayun's tomb already.
The two gave an account of being scammed a few days back by a young man claiming to be from Nepal and working on solar energy projects and directing them to a rickshaw that took them to the wrong place where prices were about 10 times as high as they should be. It's hard to know who to trust!
Some encounters on the train to delhi proved that there are still good hearted people around, thankfully. A British couple i met on the desert safari had extolled Indian railway travel And said that you can get cheap and good thallis and the chai wallahs appear every 5 minutes. So i naively got onto the train hungry - and remained so for the next few hours when nothing appeared! At last in desperation ingot out and started wandering about and asked an indian lady with two kids if she knew if there was food. She didn't think there was food service - but very kindly offered me a whole loaf of bread with cheese and biscuits and chips! (for the record, dinner later appeared, at 10pm after I'd gone to bed.) the lady was teaching her kids english and they were playing a game where the kids took turns saying english words starting with the last alphabet of the word the other kid had said. They were too cute!
No one had told me that train travel was motion sickness inducing - which it was especially since I was assigned a top bunk without a window. So in the morning I opened the train door and stood by it watching the landscape roll past - an enchanting experience (but proclaimed on the train door to be "dangerous") which also gave me the opportunity to talk to an Indian man from jodhpur (he said he owned several businesses and a home stay there) going up to Delhi to visit cousins. He told me that India had see very good law schools... Something I happened to know for some reason :) (He also said that there are two reasons why people go to Varanasi - for religion and for drugs. Even Pushkar had that reputation, he said - and I immediately remembered someone asking roger in one of the ghats of he wanted hash!)
I also saw some scenes when we got to Delhi and its outskirts that Janet reminded me later could have come out of slum dog millionaire - people defecating and hanging clothes to dry and living in shacks right next to the tracks. (before that, the landscape had been desert and then farms.) my driver in Delhi explains that the number of slums in Delhi has decreased since the commonwealth games as they pushed out the slum dwellers. He said they were not moved into public housing but that in fact the government had given up on providing housing for slum dwellers because when they did in the past, the slum dwellers sold the houses they were given, took the cash, and settled in another slum! (gotta check the veracity of this.) the driver though it was because they tended to be migrants from other parts of the country and so did not intend to stay permanently in Delhi anyway. (this driver reminds me of the stereotypical Singapore taxi driver. He can't talk local politics with me but his insinuations about "the government" and "the British people" were rather assertive.)
---------------------
Whatever the failings of the British according to the car driver, they sure knew how to build. After visiting the park and tombs yesterday, we drove around Lutyen's new Delhi. Naipaul described the architectural style as a blend of English and Indian in a practical way that suited the climate of the subcontinent. My analysis was hardly that advanced - what I was taken aback by was how the layout of the Rajpath - a long flower lined road where republic ceremonies are held on independence day, stretching from the India gate one end to the presidential building on the other - reminded me of the mall in Washington DC (from Capitol hill to washington monument to Lincoln memorial). But the Rajpath was IMMENSELY grander and more magnificent! (what all those tourists are doing in DC instead of Delhi, I have no clue.) the Indians are obviously prouder in its upkeep too - the fields and flowers and the road that ran through it were very well kept, unlike their American counterparts.
Another thing that brought back memories of happy DC days was meeting up with shubhangi for breakfast this morning (we used to hang out while on exchange in Georgetown). I was afraid she might not make it - our first two tries were aborted when her work hours proved impossible (law firms everywhere are the same) - but we did in the end and it was nice to catch up. (We've now met in 3 countries!) it was also fun riding an autorickshaw (what she calls an "auto") through Delhi in the chilly morning wind to meet her - these are open 3 wheeled green and yellow transports that take advantage of their smaller size to weave in and out of traffic (there was one point we were jammed in between 3 cars on a two lane road). I was quite proud at not getting that badly ripped off - the first one I flagged down quoted 120 rs, but I'd been told not to pay more than 100 if just in Delhi - and so flagged another one, which quoted 90. Later, shubhangi put me in another and asked the guy to use the meter. It cost 70 - close enough! :)
I'm now at the airport waiting quite excitedly for the flight to Dubai, fortified with some chocolate (suddenly had a craving - there isn't much of chocolate in indian cuisine). This box joins some other more interesting purchases, namely - salwar kameez! Its been really interesting noting Indian women's fashion - looking at all the beautifully patterned sarees made up of a 6 metre piece of cloth (a shopkeeper in dilli haat told me they had "ready made sarees" for tourists who didn't know how to tie them!) and salwar kameez (with trousers). I've realised that traditional garment shops here don't hang up their wares like we're used to - you sit down with a shopkeeper who shows you the different grades of cloth and styles and quotes prices for them, and then you point at the kind you'd like to see more colours and patterns of and they bring them out to show you (a labour intensive process!). Perhaps they do that because there's not enough shop space to show everything. Anyway, have experimented with some new clothes for me and the brother while out shopping yesterday. (at fixed price shops, of course - cooperatives run by the government. I would not come off well haggling.) Another fashion intrigue has been the wide variety of bangles women wear here - it's traditional to wear two or three inches of bangles on EACH arm!
Gandhi would definitely appreciate the simplicity of his memorial compared to some of the kings of ages past. I visited humayun's tomb yesterday after recuperating from the long train journey and the instructional exhibit showed the silhouettes of emperors and shahs of the subcontinent and persia - gosh were they elaborate. But none so elaborate as humayun's tomb itself. Stepping into the stone archway through which you see the tomb for the first time, I was quite awestruck - the irreverent "Oh my God" was all that crossed my mind for a few seconds. And this wasn't even the Taj!
The garden surrounding the tomb was peaceful and green too - and it had fountains and water channels crossing the garden perpendicularly in a way that represented the 4 streams mentioned in the Koran. This must be the metaphorical equivalent of the steams that watered the garden of Eden in genesis - which, interestingly, I just learnt represent the 4 great rivers in the middle east!
Humayun's tomb was apparently Shah Jahan's inspiration for the Taj. I've heard from two other travellers so far that visiting the Taj - despite its hype and commercialisation - is one of the most amazing experiences they've had in India. This morning at breakfast an American couple who'd spent two months in India affirmed its wonders - and I have been idly speculating if I was be any less awed having seen humayun's tomb already.
The two gave an account of being scammed a few days back by a young man claiming to be from Nepal and working on solar energy projects and directing them to a rickshaw that took them to the wrong place where prices were about 10 times as high as they should be. It's hard to know who to trust!
Some encounters on the train to delhi proved that there are still good hearted people around, thankfully. A British couple i met on the desert safari had extolled Indian railway travel And said that you can get cheap and good thallis and the chai wallahs appear every 5 minutes. So i naively got onto the train hungry - and remained so for the next few hours when nothing appeared! At last in desperation ingot out and started wandering about and asked an indian lady with two kids if she knew if there was food. She didn't think there was food service - but very kindly offered me a whole loaf of bread with cheese and biscuits and chips! (for the record, dinner later appeared, at 10pm after I'd gone to bed.) the lady was teaching her kids english and they were playing a game where the kids took turns saying english words starting with the last alphabet of the word the other kid had said. They were too cute!
No one had told me that train travel was motion sickness inducing - which it was especially since I was assigned a top bunk without a window. So in the morning I opened the train door and stood by it watching the landscape roll past - an enchanting experience (but proclaimed on the train door to be "dangerous") which also gave me the opportunity to talk to an Indian man from jodhpur (he said he owned several businesses and a home stay there) going up to Delhi to visit cousins. He told me that India had see very good law schools... Something I happened to know for some reason :) (He also said that there are two reasons why people go to Varanasi - for religion and for drugs. Even Pushkar had that reputation, he said - and I immediately remembered someone asking roger in one of the ghats of he wanted hash!)
I also saw some scenes when we got to Delhi and its outskirts that Janet reminded me later could have come out of slum dog millionaire - people defecating and hanging clothes to dry and living in shacks right next to the tracks. (before that, the landscape had been desert and then farms.) my driver in Delhi explains that the number of slums in Delhi has decreased since the commonwealth games as they pushed out the slum dwellers. He said they were not moved into public housing but that in fact the government had given up on providing housing for slum dwellers because when they did in the past, the slum dwellers sold the houses they were given, took the cash, and settled in another slum! (gotta check the veracity of this.) the driver though it was because they tended to be migrants from other parts of the country and so did not intend to stay permanently in Delhi anyway. (this driver reminds me of the stereotypical Singapore taxi driver. He can't talk local politics with me but his insinuations about "the government" and "the British people" were rather assertive.)
---------------------
Whatever the failings of the British according to the car driver, they sure knew how to build. After visiting the park and tombs yesterday, we drove around Lutyen's new Delhi. Naipaul described the architectural style as a blend of English and Indian in a practical way that suited the climate of the subcontinent. My analysis was hardly that advanced - what I was taken aback by was how the layout of the Rajpath - a long flower lined road where republic ceremonies are held on independence day, stretching from the India gate one end to the presidential building on the other - reminded me of the mall in Washington DC (from Capitol hill to washington monument to Lincoln memorial). But the Rajpath was IMMENSELY grander and more magnificent! (what all those tourists are doing in DC instead of Delhi, I have no clue.) the Indians are obviously prouder in its upkeep too - the fields and flowers and the road that ran through it were very well kept, unlike their American counterparts.
Another thing that brought back memories of happy DC days was meeting up with shubhangi for breakfast this morning (we used to hang out while on exchange in Georgetown). I was afraid she might not make it - our first two tries were aborted when her work hours proved impossible (law firms everywhere are the same) - but we did in the end and it was nice to catch up. (We've now met in 3 countries!) it was also fun riding an autorickshaw (what she calls an "auto") through Delhi in the chilly morning wind to meet her - these are open 3 wheeled green and yellow transports that take advantage of their smaller size to weave in and out of traffic (there was one point we were jammed in between 3 cars on a two lane road). I was quite proud at not getting that badly ripped off - the first one I flagged down quoted 120 rs, but I'd been told not to pay more than 100 if just in Delhi - and so flagged another one, which quoted 90. Later, shubhangi put me in another and asked the guy to use the meter. It cost 70 - close enough! :)
I'm now at the airport waiting quite excitedly for the flight to Dubai, fortified with some chocolate (suddenly had a craving - there isn't much of chocolate in indian cuisine). This box joins some other more interesting purchases, namely - salwar kameez! Its been really interesting noting Indian women's fashion - looking at all the beautifully patterned sarees made up of a 6 metre piece of cloth (a shopkeeper in dilli haat told me they had "ready made sarees" for tourists who didn't know how to tie them!) and salwar kameez (with trousers). I've realised that traditional garment shops here don't hang up their wares like we're used to - you sit down with a shopkeeper who shows you the different grades of cloth and styles and quotes prices for them, and then you point at the kind you'd like to see more colours and patterns of and they bring them out to show you (a labour intensive process!). Perhaps they do that because there's not enough shop space to show everything. Anyway, have experimented with some new clothes for me and the brother while out shopping yesterday. (at fixed price shops, of course - cooperatives run by the government. I would not come off well haggling.) Another fashion intrigue has been the wide variety of bangles women wear here - it's traditional to wear two or three inches of bangles on EACH arm!
Day 12 finds me in a dingy little hotel room in Jaisalmer fort. I thought it would be thrilling to stay in the fort itself... But this place is smoky and dusty and I am hesitant to come into contact with any of the room's surfaces. (At least the sheets and towels smell nicely laundered.) I'm also feeling rather tired of Indian travel - by and large, the people I've encountered here have been exceedingly rude (unless you paid them, and sometimes even so) and especially so here in Jaisalmer, for some reason. (When D suggested that I should have liked bundi because it was a small town with "friendly people", I almost stared.)
Anyway, perhaps this anticlimax should be expected since I've just come back from the desert safari - the part of this leg of the trip I was most excited about. It was indeed a great experience. I'd arranged to go with a company called "trotters in-dependent", and though the price was slightly steep compared to other operators, they brought us to pristine un-touristy areas and provided good service that made for an incredible experience. We started off in a jeep and visited a village and then an abandoned fort (if tales can be believed, it and the surrounding village failed and fell into ruins because they went against the wishes of a particular Brahmin leader), and then got onto camels for a ride to the dunes. (Most of the Thar desert is not made of dunes but more scrubland and rock. It took a while to notice the difference in landscapes. When DB first pointed out that this desert was different than others because everywhere you look, the landscape changes, I had no clue what he was talking about. City eyes!) On the way to our camels, we passed a herd of females (kept for milk and breeding) that were just standing about - there must have been at least 60 camels there, an amazing sight.
Camels are incredibly arrogant looking (but terribly endearing) creatures, the way their necks arch up even when they're asleep. They have three joints in their hind legs and only two in their front legs. Riding astride a camel involves rather ponderous back and forth motions that become rather uncomfortable after a while - except when the camels are put into a run, in which case you just bounce up and down instead of in 4 directions.
There were 10 of us tourists in the party that set out, and we arrived at the dunes in time for a delightful ramble before sunset and dinner. There was another herd of pasturing camels over the other side of the dunes, a group of which were wallowing in the sand together. The camel herder was playing what sounded like an angklung - perhaps to keep the camels together? The dunes themselves were nothing short of expectations - windswept and rising sedately out of the surrounding scrubland. Sand must have really low heat capacity - the changes in temperature with sunset and sunrise were dramatic and quick. The sun looked like a huge egg yolk on the horizon (an honest but necessarily un romantic description) - it surprised me that you could just look at it directly. When the light went down we had dinner in the dark, cooked by the camel drivers over a wood fire. It was nice to be in the company of other tourists - there was an ethnically Indian couple from England who were in their 11th month of traveling around the world and keenly interested in discussing social issues, and a group of American undergrads doing a sustainable development & social change programme in Jaipur. I do miss having unguarded conversations! (And for this reason am looking forward very much to Dubai.)
After dinner the stars came out - a satisfying blanket across the sky - you could make out an arm of the milky way and certain well known constellations (and the planets mercury, Venus and mars). Perhaps memory deceives, but I thought I had seen a much clearer night sky in new Zealand than this - but perhaps that was the first time I'd seen an arm of the galaxy and therefore found it more spellbinding. Interestingly, after we got into our blankets (it was getting quite cold at this time) the moon rose - and it was so bright that as it made its way across the sky, its light quite overwhelmed the starlight and you couldn't see all but the brightest stars anymore! As it was just coming over the horizon, it looked justified a white china plate.
It was quite cold despite the blankets and I woke up a few times, guessing at the time from the progress of the moon overhead. Somewhere in the middle of the night though I woke up in a cold sweat after a nightmare about A. Gosh, the violence of it was quite shocking, and after I woke and realised I was still in the desert, thought how petty this all is in the face of such wonderful and rugged terrain. (Weirdly, DB had read my palm while we were on the dunes and told me to be less worried about things. He felt i was tired in spirit and thought I had just broke up with a boyfriend.) Anyway, I then realised I had to go to the toilet... And in the dunes in the light of the moon and in the freezing temperature it was quite an adventure to do it in the natural way!
This and udaipur have been the highlights of the trip thus far. Time for some hopefully quiet days in Delhi - on my list are meeting up with S and shopping for some souvenirs - and hence to Dubai!
Anyway, perhaps this anticlimax should be expected since I've just come back from the desert safari - the part of this leg of the trip I was most excited about. It was indeed a great experience. I'd arranged to go with a company called "trotters in-dependent", and though the price was slightly steep compared to other operators, they brought us to pristine un-touristy areas and provided good service that made for an incredible experience. We started off in a jeep and visited a village and then an abandoned fort (if tales can be believed, it and the surrounding village failed and fell into ruins because they went against the wishes of a particular Brahmin leader), and then got onto camels for a ride to the dunes. (Most of the Thar desert is not made of dunes but more scrubland and rock. It took a while to notice the difference in landscapes. When DB first pointed out that this desert was different than others because everywhere you look, the landscape changes, I had no clue what he was talking about. City eyes!) On the way to our camels, we passed a herd of females (kept for milk and breeding) that were just standing about - there must have been at least 60 camels there, an amazing sight.
Camels are incredibly arrogant looking (but terribly endearing) creatures, the way their necks arch up even when they're asleep. They have three joints in their hind legs and only two in their front legs. Riding astride a camel involves rather ponderous back and forth motions that become rather uncomfortable after a while - except when the camels are put into a run, in which case you just bounce up and down instead of in 4 directions.
There were 10 of us tourists in the party that set out, and we arrived at the dunes in time for a delightful ramble before sunset and dinner. There was another herd of pasturing camels over the other side of the dunes, a group of which were wallowing in the sand together. The camel herder was playing what sounded like an angklung - perhaps to keep the camels together? The dunes themselves were nothing short of expectations - windswept and rising sedately out of the surrounding scrubland. Sand must have really low heat capacity - the changes in temperature with sunset and sunrise were dramatic and quick. The sun looked like a huge egg yolk on the horizon (an honest but necessarily un romantic description) - it surprised me that you could just look at it directly. When the light went down we had dinner in the dark, cooked by the camel drivers over a wood fire. It was nice to be in the company of other tourists - there was an ethnically Indian couple from England who were in their 11th month of traveling around the world and keenly interested in discussing social issues, and a group of American undergrads doing a sustainable development & social change programme in Jaipur. I do miss having unguarded conversations! (And for this reason am looking forward very much to Dubai.)
After dinner the stars came out - a satisfying blanket across the sky - you could make out an arm of the milky way and certain well known constellations (and the planets mercury, Venus and mars). Perhaps memory deceives, but I thought I had seen a much clearer night sky in new Zealand than this - but perhaps that was the first time I'd seen an arm of the galaxy and therefore found it more spellbinding. Interestingly, after we got into our blankets (it was getting quite cold at this time) the moon rose - and it was so bright that as it made its way across the sky, its light quite overwhelmed the starlight and you couldn't see all but the brightest stars anymore! As it was just coming over the horizon, it looked justified a white china plate.
It was quite cold despite the blankets and I woke up a few times, guessing at the time from the progress of the moon overhead. Somewhere in the middle of the night though I woke up in a cold sweat after a nightmare about A. Gosh, the violence of it was quite shocking, and after I woke and realised I was still in the desert, thought how petty this all is in the face of such wonderful and rugged terrain. (Weirdly, DB had read my palm while we were on the dunes and told me to be less worried about things. He felt i was tired in spirit and thought I had just broke up with a boyfriend.) Anyway, I then realised I had to go to the toilet... And in the dunes in the light of the moon and in the freezing temperature it was quite an adventure to do it in the natural way!
This and udaipur have been the highlights of the trip thus far. Time for some hopefully quiet days in Delhi - on my list are meeting up with S and shopping for some souvenirs - and hence to Dubai!
After a half day of rambling around fort, palace and market in jodhpur, I'm settling down to enjoy the rest of the day relaxing in my delightful blue room in Indra-Shan. This has become a pattern of the days - though I'm usually a hectic traveller if left to my own devices, the heat and the city crowds have meant that after each half day of adventure, I get lots of down time and have been catching up on a lot of reading. iTunes u has been amazing - in particular, Wellesley college's albright institute has a series of lectures on world affairs, development and social justice there that makes me wish we could have something half so interesting at NUS! Resource for the swimmers, perhaps?
While at udaipur I also finished austen's "sense and sensibility", but was rather discomfited by marianne's being pushed into marrying colonel Brandon when she didn't like his disposition. The moral I suppose was clear - don't settle for flashy sensibilities but go for the pure, noble heart. But why not take into account marianne's own preferences? And in the first place, why was it of the utmost importance to marry? Ah well, I suppose it was the work of another age.
One myth about India that has been dispelled for me is that you don't see many women about in the streets, or that they're always accompanied by a male. I'd read that in a couple of places but certainly have not seen it much in reality - there are unaccompanied women all over the place. Only certain areas have been dominated by men. It might perhaps be true though that the male figure is expected to be the public figure - many more men have spoken to me than women. Intriguingly, several people have talked to me about arranged marriages recently and I get the impression that among middle class young professionals, it is seen as a "backup" that might be relied on should they not find a suitable partner from their social circles. The way it is done though has changed - the traditional "bride viewing" practice has been eschewed in favour of having the two potentials meet and get to know each other over time. (The Singapore government's matchmaking practice certainly bears some similarity to this :))
Speaking of brides, there was a particularly chilling relic of the practice of immolation at the jodhpur fort. On the gate were the small vermillion hand prints of wives of maharajas who'd died, made as they were being taken out of the palace for the last time. They would ride through the streets to the temple to make an offering to the gods, giving alms along the way, and then sit silently on their husbands' funeral pyre as the flames blazed up around them. I can't imagine what must have gone through their minds or those of their onlookers as they were making those handprints. Thankfully, this practice has been made illegal for a while now.
Yesterday was the day of Holi, in celebration of the harvest. Our driver had muttered darkly about potential trouble and wanted to start off only after noon, and so I had some trepidation about it. But on that morning I resolved to take a short walk to satisfy my curiousity, and indeed it was a riot - of colour! kids were ambushing passers-by with water guns and water bombs dropped from a height, and people were walking up to total strangers and rubbing them with bright water colours from small plastic bags. It was good fun - ten minutes later I was pink and orange and completely soaked - and for the first time I could let down my guard (only one person asked me for money) and feel the friendliness of people in the streets.
As we drove to ranakpur, people in most of the towns along the way bore the same colourful marks of Holi. And dhramvir was proven right about the trouble that could come up - there was a huge crowd in front of some police stations we passed.
In the middle of a hilly stretch of desert, we came upon the Jain temple at ranakpur. This was the most beautiful I'd seen so far, with a forest of white stone columns shading cool white courtyards, and intricate carvings on every surface of flowers and elephants and other symbols of nature. A deeply peaceful, most welcome respite from the desert heat, and a marvel of craftsmanship.
And then we reached my current abode. It's a sweet homestay owned by a couple with family connections to the current maharaja of jodhpur, apparently. Yesterday at the delicious home made dinner they prepared, there was a couple from England on their 8th trip to India who were telling easy stories about their adventures on the road, which made for a pleasant evening. I hope there are more interesting characters tonight, as much as I'm shy of meeting people. And then tomorrow to jaisalmer and the long awaiting camel safari. I can't wait! :)
While at udaipur I also finished austen's "sense and sensibility", but was rather discomfited by marianne's being pushed into marrying colonel Brandon when she didn't like his disposition. The moral I suppose was clear - don't settle for flashy sensibilities but go for the pure, noble heart. But why not take into account marianne's own preferences? And in the first place, why was it of the utmost importance to marry? Ah well, I suppose it was the work of another age.
One myth about India that has been dispelled for me is that you don't see many women about in the streets, or that they're always accompanied by a male. I'd read that in a couple of places but certainly have not seen it much in reality - there are unaccompanied women all over the place. Only certain areas have been dominated by men. It might perhaps be true though that the male figure is expected to be the public figure - many more men have spoken to me than women. Intriguingly, several people have talked to me about arranged marriages recently and I get the impression that among middle class young professionals, it is seen as a "backup" that might be relied on should they not find a suitable partner from their social circles. The way it is done though has changed - the traditional "bride viewing" practice has been eschewed in favour of having the two potentials meet and get to know each other over time. (The Singapore government's matchmaking practice certainly bears some similarity to this :))
Speaking of brides, there was a particularly chilling relic of the practice of immolation at the jodhpur fort. On the gate were the small vermillion hand prints of wives of maharajas who'd died, made as they were being taken out of the palace for the last time. They would ride through the streets to the temple to make an offering to the gods, giving alms along the way, and then sit silently on their husbands' funeral pyre as the flames blazed up around them. I can't imagine what must have gone through their minds or those of their onlookers as they were making those handprints. Thankfully, this practice has been made illegal for a while now.
Yesterday was the day of Holi, in celebration of the harvest. Our driver had muttered darkly about potential trouble and wanted to start off only after noon, and so I had some trepidation about it. But on that morning I resolved to take a short walk to satisfy my curiousity, and indeed it was a riot - of colour! kids were ambushing passers-by with water guns and water bombs dropped from a height, and people were walking up to total strangers and rubbing them with bright water colours from small plastic bags. It was good fun - ten minutes later I was pink and orange and completely soaked - and for the first time I could let down my guard (only one person asked me for money) and feel the friendliness of people in the streets.
As we drove to ranakpur, people in most of the towns along the way bore the same colourful marks of Holi. And dhramvir was proven right about the trouble that could come up - there was a huge crowd in front of some police stations we passed.
In the middle of a hilly stretch of desert, we came upon the Jain temple at ranakpur. This was the most beautiful I'd seen so far, with a forest of white stone columns shading cool white courtyards, and intricate carvings on every surface of flowers and elephants and other symbols of nature. A deeply peaceful, most welcome respite from the desert heat, and a marvel of craftsmanship.
And then we reached my current abode. It's a sweet homestay owned by a couple with family connections to the current maharaja of jodhpur, apparently. Yesterday at the delicious home made dinner they prepared, there was a couple from England on their 8th trip to India who were telling easy stories about their adventures on the road, which made for a pleasant evening. I hope there are more interesting characters tonight, as much as I'm shy of meeting people. And then tomorrow to jaisalmer and the long awaiting camel safari. I can't wait! :)
It's been a wonderful day of surprises. The morning brought news that the weekly day off for maids in Singapore has finally passed into law. After so long, finally! The next step is implementation. I wonder how they will monitor this. I can just foresee students coming up to ask for make up classes and saying they only have certain days off... And then what do we do? Having a legal right does not change things unless you take the initiative to invoke it... And here some of our students surely still need to learn to be more assertive.
Then we left bundi. Yesterday I had gone out to see bundi and walked up to the palace, which was a shorter walk than I thought. The streets were quite bewildering. I usually pride myself on my sense of direction, but got completely lost. Thankfully I found the tourist office and they pointed me to the place I was staying - just 30 metres down the road in the opposite direction!
The streets were quite full of life. There was the new city and the old walled city. Was it in neuromancer that gibson's main character says that you can't help but compare strange cities to what you know? To me the new city looked like cebu. Or it could have been in Malaysia - except for the Hindu temples. There were so many picture-able moments that I didn't dare to capture because the subjects in question were looking at me and might have asked for money. Especially in the vegetable market - people sitting in stalls surrounded by a riot of colours. But I did take surreptitious shots while in the walled city. Streets here were narrower and so many of the houses were really blue! When I came back out, it was time for children to return from school and it was enchanting to walk down a blue tinted residential lane and see the activities of daily life. Or it would have been, except that everyone looked at me like they'd never seen (1) a woman (in the case of the males) or (2) a Chinese person (everyone else) before (or actually, japanese or Korean, which most people thought, very loudly). It gets quite trying to have everyone either ask you for money or ogle and whistle at you. Many of the kids said hello (and some of them didn't ask for photographs).
Okay, rant over. Today was much of the same but I guess that's just being a tourist in India! It's sad though that all most tourists see of people in India is their manoeuvring for "filthy lucre", Montgomery would say.
Anyway, daily life was interesting to see in bundi. Today we passed through chittorgarh fort on the way to udaipur. We had started off following the car of a German tourist couple, of which the guy was quite chatty and struck up a conversation at a rest stop. When we got to the fort, true to German stereotype his first comment was, "this fort is so much cleaner than the one at bundi!" That indeed was true... Though it would have been difficult to expect otherwise given the abundance of macaque droppings in bundi fort (well, that's nature). Chittorgarh fort was huge and more spread out, but also more "ruined". The impression one got under the hot sun in the rugged hills was of hard times in an inhospitable land. (Impression accentuated by random people on the road asking you for money.) and indeed, I learnt later that this used to be the capital of the mewar kingdom before udaipur and had suffered rather violent wars that saw all the male inhabitants ride out a last time to die while the females committed mass suicide by immolation. O_o
What made the place for me was an intricately carved tall tower of stone that you could climb, right to the top, up narrow winding stone steps. The architecture - experienced from the inside - was nothing short of amazing, and almost every surface was covered in delicate religious carvings. Of course, the only thing to spoil it was a man asking if I wanted to take a photo with his children (with a certain request of rupees to follow, I have no doubt).
Then came the winding road to udaipur. I was feeling quite car sick by that time and my first impression of the city was of ugliness - it reminded me again of the dirtier part of Cebu. But then dharam dropped me off at a "monument" which turned out to be a rather well kept garden - unexpected calm amidst the chaos!
But the best moment was still to come. I checked in to the haveli hotel... Right on the banks of lake pichola. The view from the rooftop is unbelievably lovely - and the more precious because it can't be caught on camera! When night descended, the city lit up - and took my breath away. You could hear all the sounds of the city as life went on - chants and prayers and dances. The city on the lake between the aravalli hills - could there be another experience of India so magical? Just as I thought that, the night sky erupted in fireworks.
Even if nothing else beautiful happens in India, I will return home satisfied!
Then we left bundi. Yesterday I had gone out to see bundi and walked up to the palace, which was a shorter walk than I thought. The streets were quite bewildering. I usually pride myself on my sense of direction, but got completely lost. Thankfully I found the tourist office and they pointed me to the place I was staying - just 30 metres down the road in the opposite direction!
The streets were quite full of life. There was the new city and the old walled city. Was it in neuromancer that gibson's main character says that you can't help but compare strange cities to what you know? To me the new city looked like cebu. Or it could have been in Malaysia - except for the Hindu temples. There were so many picture-able moments that I didn't dare to capture because the subjects in question were looking at me and might have asked for money. Especially in the vegetable market - people sitting in stalls surrounded by a riot of colours. But I did take surreptitious shots while in the walled city. Streets here were narrower and so many of the houses were really blue! When I came back out, it was time for children to return from school and it was enchanting to walk down a blue tinted residential lane and see the activities of daily life. Or it would have been, except that everyone looked at me like they'd never seen (1) a woman (in the case of the males) or (2) a Chinese person (everyone else) before (or actually, japanese or Korean, which most people thought, very loudly). It gets quite trying to have everyone either ask you for money or ogle and whistle at you. Many of the kids said hello (and some of them didn't ask for photographs).
Okay, rant over. Today was much of the same but I guess that's just being a tourist in India! It's sad though that all most tourists see of people in India is their manoeuvring for "filthy lucre", Montgomery would say.
Anyway, daily life was interesting to see in bundi. Today we passed through chittorgarh fort on the way to udaipur. We had started off following the car of a German tourist couple, of which the guy was quite chatty and struck up a conversation at a rest stop. When we got to the fort, true to German stereotype his first comment was, "this fort is so much cleaner than the one at bundi!" That indeed was true... Though it would have been difficult to expect otherwise given the abundance of macaque droppings in bundi fort (well, that's nature). Chittorgarh fort was huge and more spread out, but also more "ruined". The impression one got under the hot sun in the rugged hills was of hard times in an inhospitable land. (Impression accentuated by random people on the road asking you for money.) and indeed, I learnt later that this used to be the capital of the mewar kingdom before udaipur and had suffered rather violent wars that saw all the male inhabitants ride out a last time to die while the females committed mass suicide by immolation. O_o
What made the place for me was an intricately carved tall tower of stone that you could climb, right to the top, up narrow winding stone steps. The architecture - experienced from the inside - was nothing short of amazing, and almost every surface was covered in delicate religious carvings. Of course, the only thing to spoil it was a man asking if I wanted to take a photo with his children (with a certain request of rupees to follow, I have no doubt).
Then came the winding road to udaipur. I was feeling quite car sick by that time and my first impression of the city was of ugliness - it reminded me again of the dirtier part of Cebu. But then dharam dropped me off at a "monument" which turned out to be a rather well kept garden - unexpected calm amidst the chaos!
But the best moment was still to come. I checked in to the haveli hotel... Right on the banks of lake pichola. The view from the rooftop is unbelievably lovely - and the more precious because it can't be caught on camera! When night descended, the city lit up - and took my breath away. You could hear all the sounds of the city as life went on - chants and prayers and dances. The city on the lake between the aravalli hills - could there be another experience of India so magical? Just as I thought that, the night sky erupted in fireworks.
Even if nothing else beautiful happens in India, I will return home satisfied!
Day 6 starts off quietly in a luxurious white sheeted hotel room in bundi, rajasthan, with a full length window opening into bundi town and palace in the distance. Bundi town is speckled with Brahmin blue houses, making for a unique sight.
The trip so far has been lovely. Because of this arrangement with magic tours that i came to as a compromise for the parents, I've been having a more sanitised experience than I wanted, but it's been interesting all the same. The first day we landed in Delhi, we were taken to visit akshardam temple, a curious mix of Hindu temple cum Disneyland cum stricter than airport security that I still can't quite wrap my head around. The architecture was beautiful, but it was only decades old (so not that amazing!), and commemorated a religious figure and the order he founded. Around the base of the temple were very cute carvings of elephants in various poses that contributed to the Disneyland feel. I must remember to ask a delhi native what they think of the complex.
Day 2 involved driving 6 hours to Jaipur, the pink capital of Rajasthan. It was really pink and made for see nice shots. We walked around the bazaars in late afternoon, which was a gauntlet of "come see my shop" and "nice clothes here madam" and "where are you from? Korea? Japan? China? Malaysia?". The local scene was very busy - besides the cows and goats generally hanging out in the (very) dusty street, people were walking with an intent workday air carrying all kinds of stuff and pushing carts. The traffic was amazing - autorickshaws and bicycles and cars honking at each other on the narrow streets fringed with construction works.
I can see why driving in India has the reputation it genuinely deserves. Our driver dharam tells us that in India, what you need to drive are "good horn, good brakes and good luck". Frivolous things like road lane markers don't seem to have any pull with Indian drivers, who crowd into any available space between other vehicles (and animals). We were quite amused yesterday driving into bundi to have to honk at a few goats crossing the road with impunity right in the middle of the busy town market.
Anyway, back to Jaipur. Day 3 saw us finally exhausting ourselves with a full day of sightseeing, first climbing around amber fort, a really majestic monument carved into the side of a rugged hill. Visitors can take elephant rides up to the fort, and the line of red velvet decorated elephants slowly but surely making their way up to the fort added a real exotic feel. (have i said that crossing the road in india is a harrowing experience? This includes crossing the road to the fort with elephants coming both ways.) There were also flocks of pigeons flapping around creating atmosphere - r said you felt like you were in a John woo film.
The building itself was grand and picturesque - is the pinkish hue to everything here because of the building stone? - and as usual I had the most fun snapping photos, especially of stairs and doorways. Photography, besides its inherent fun factor, is giving me added purpose on this trip as well, because the insight Dubai conference I'll attend in the third week is also hosting a photography competition for participants with the theme "culture". What a great opportunity for me in India! but to date i have not gotten any real "eureka" shots. In my experience the most spectacular photos would involve people and cultural icons... But though I've had those in bits and pieces in photos to date (mostly in pushkar) they don't all come together with stunning composition thrown in too. Well, I still have 2 days to the submission date and today will be a grand photo taking romp.
But I'm getting ahead of myself. So after amber we went on to Jaigarh fort above it, then to the city palace and the hawa mahal (wind palace). It was interesting to see some exhibits of palace life, including the royal family's diplomatic interactions with the British. I've been reading more of Naipaul on this journey and in exploring Portuguese goa he said that colonialism tends to clear the history slate so that everything that came before becomes timeless and non existent. Thankfully Rajasthan still does exhibit some of its more recent history before the British. There was a particular exhibit of the king and the queen in their separate dining halls being waited on by servants in period costume that was intriguing.
Day 4 saw us driving to pushkar, a small Hindu pilgrimage town that also receives many tourists and so, true to the lonely planet guide book, is a curious mix of religious and touristy scenes. I loved the atmosphere - the dusty streets were filled with locals going about their business, animals again wandering around (I have a picture of 2 cows with their heads locked together in the middle of the road that refused to move despite drivers' horns!), and tourists buses bringing religious domestic tourists - mostly older folk bearing the red holy marks on their foreheads - and clueless western people walking around in the particular attire that goes with being a western tourist in a rough developing country. Pushkar is a town surrounding a holy lake that pilgrims go to bathe it, but you would not know it walking in the bazaars surrounded by tourist shops selling a colourful array of stuff. Here and there were entrances to the ghats - and dawdling too near one, flowers were foisted upon us and and we stumbled into a religious ritual which ended up with me gullibly parting with 500rs. Roger was set upon by a pushy small boy who conducted the ritual, in a scene right out of slum dog millionaire. It was not a nice episode - especially since it was not the first time we were pressured into parting with money (the first was when our driver brought us to a textile factory in Jaipur) - but the silver lining was that we finally saw the lake, which was an amazing sight, especially with the pilgrims in their colourful costumes who were wading into the lake ghats to bathe. We walked around the lake and looked around at life - I must say pushkar is an enchanting town, except for the touts. (the other attraction people go to is the brahma temple. At its gate we were set upon by some other people purporting to tell us the rules of the temple - by then I was so fed up I decided not to go in.)
Yesterday, we drove from pushkar to bundi and visited the bundi palace and fort. Apparently bundi is less touristy than some other rajasthan towns, and accordingly the palace and fort were less well kept and more true to form in that sense, In fact, in the absence of other tourists I felt like we could have been in an Indiana jones movie. Adventurer I am not - we were buzzed and followed by a bee / hornet on the way up to the fort that we could only get rid of by spraying insect repellent. You can imagine it led to some tense moments. And those red bottomed macaques! After that I was reassured by the sight of other tourists in the cool overgrown palace. I felt like we were desecrating the beloved haunts of a people long gone. Only some of the paintings were left and those were fading too... And the bare stone did not leave much suggestion of what those halls and courtyards were used for. In the ladies' hall there were paintings of thebpalace ladies pursuing their daily entertainments in and around the palace, which made me wonder - What would the people who lived there think if they could see it now, overgrown and dilapidated with strangers walking through their halls?
From the palace and fort on the hill there were terrific views of the city and it's blue houses. It was an ideal setting for a prince and the pauper type story - I wouldn't be surprised if the courtiers looked down on the city and wondered what daily life there was like. Speaking of which, today I will elude our driver and venture out to find out on my own! Better go down to check if there is still free breakfast available before I set out. Till next time!
The trip so far has been lovely. Because of this arrangement with magic tours that i came to as a compromise for the parents, I've been having a more sanitised experience than I wanted, but it's been interesting all the same. The first day we landed in Delhi, we were taken to visit akshardam temple, a curious mix of Hindu temple cum Disneyland cum stricter than airport security that I still can't quite wrap my head around. The architecture was beautiful, but it was only decades old (so not that amazing!), and commemorated a religious figure and the order he founded. Around the base of the temple were very cute carvings of elephants in various poses that contributed to the Disneyland feel. I must remember to ask a delhi native what they think of the complex.
Day 2 involved driving 6 hours to Jaipur, the pink capital of Rajasthan. It was really pink and made for see nice shots. We walked around the bazaars in late afternoon, which was a gauntlet of "come see my shop" and "nice clothes here madam" and "where are you from? Korea? Japan? China? Malaysia?". The local scene was very busy - besides the cows and goats generally hanging out in the (very) dusty street, people were walking with an intent workday air carrying all kinds of stuff and pushing carts. The traffic was amazing - autorickshaws and bicycles and cars honking at each other on the narrow streets fringed with construction works.
I can see why driving in India has the reputation it genuinely deserves. Our driver dharam tells us that in India, what you need to drive are "good horn, good brakes and good luck". Frivolous things like road lane markers don't seem to have any pull with Indian drivers, who crowd into any available space between other vehicles (and animals). We were quite amused yesterday driving into bundi to have to honk at a few goats crossing the road with impunity right in the middle of the busy town market.
Anyway, back to Jaipur. Day 3 saw us finally exhausting ourselves with a full day of sightseeing, first climbing around amber fort, a really majestic monument carved into the side of a rugged hill. Visitors can take elephant rides up to the fort, and the line of red velvet decorated elephants slowly but surely making their way up to the fort added a real exotic feel. (have i said that crossing the road in india is a harrowing experience? This includes crossing the road to the fort with elephants coming both ways.) There were also flocks of pigeons flapping around creating atmosphere - r said you felt like you were in a John woo film.
The building itself was grand and picturesque - is the pinkish hue to everything here because of the building stone? - and as usual I had the most fun snapping photos, especially of stairs and doorways. Photography, besides its inherent fun factor, is giving me added purpose on this trip as well, because the insight Dubai conference I'll attend in the third week is also hosting a photography competition for participants with the theme "culture". What a great opportunity for me in India! but to date i have not gotten any real "eureka" shots. In my experience the most spectacular photos would involve people and cultural icons... But though I've had those in bits and pieces in photos to date (mostly in pushkar) they don't all come together with stunning composition thrown in too. Well, I still have 2 days to the submission date and today will be a grand photo taking romp.
But I'm getting ahead of myself. So after amber we went on to Jaigarh fort above it, then to the city palace and the hawa mahal (wind palace). It was interesting to see some exhibits of palace life, including the royal family's diplomatic interactions with the British. I've been reading more of Naipaul on this journey and in exploring Portuguese goa he said that colonialism tends to clear the history slate so that everything that came before becomes timeless and non existent. Thankfully Rajasthan still does exhibit some of its more recent history before the British. There was a particular exhibit of the king and the queen in their separate dining halls being waited on by servants in period costume that was intriguing.
Day 4 saw us driving to pushkar, a small Hindu pilgrimage town that also receives many tourists and so, true to the lonely planet guide book, is a curious mix of religious and touristy scenes. I loved the atmosphere - the dusty streets were filled with locals going about their business, animals again wandering around (I have a picture of 2 cows with their heads locked together in the middle of the road that refused to move despite drivers' horns!), and tourists buses bringing religious domestic tourists - mostly older folk bearing the red holy marks on their foreheads - and clueless western people walking around in the particular attire that goes with being a western tourist in a rough developing country. Pushkar is a town surrounding a holy lake that pilgrims go to bathe it, but you would not know it walking in the bazaars surrounded by tourist shops selling a colourful array of stuff. Here and there were entrances to the ghats - and dawdling too near one, flowers were foisted upon us and and we stumbled into a religious ritual which ended up with me gullibly parting with 500rs. Roger was set upon by a pushy small boy who conducted the ritual, in a scene right out of slum dog millionaire. It was not a nice episode - especially since it was not the first time we were pressured into parting with money (the first was when our driver brought us to a textile factory in Jaipur) - but the silver lining was that we finally saw the lake, which was an amazing sight, especially with the pilgrims in their colourful costumes who were wading into the lake ghats to bathe. We walked around the lake and looked around at life - I must say pushkar is an enchanting town, except for the touts. (the other attraction people go to is the brahma temple. At its gate we were set upon by some other people purporting to tell us the rules of the temple - by then I was so fed up I decided not to go in.)
Yesterday, we drove from pushkar to bundi and visited the bundi palace and fort. Apparently bundi is less touristy than some other rajasthan towns, and accordingly the palace and fort were less well kept and more true to form in that sense, In fact, in the absence of other tourists I felt like we could have been in an Indiana jones movie. Adventurer I am not - we were buzzed and followed by a bee / hornet on the way up to the fort that we could only get rid of by spraying insect repellent. You can imagine it led to some tense moments. And those red bottomed macaques! After that I was reassured by the sight of other tourists in the cool overgrown palace. I felt like we were desecrating the beloved haunts of a people long gone. Only some of the paintings were left and those were fading too... And the bare stone did not leave much suggestion of what those halls and courtyards were used for. In the ladies' hall there were paintings of thebpalace ladies pursuing their daily entertainments in and around the palace, which made me wonder - What would the people who lived there think if they could see it now, overgrown and dilapidated with strangers walking through their halls?
From the palace and fort on the hill there were terrific views of the city and it's blue houses. It was an ideal setting for a prince and the pauper type story - I wouldn't be surprised if the courtiers looked down on the city and wondered what daily life there was like. Speaking of which, today I will elude our driver and venture out to find out on my own! Better go down to check if there is still free breakfast available before I set out. Till next time!
And some interesting things have happened, what with revolutions and my failed resignation. They have also been terribly draining and I'm still trying to recover from them.
But there have been some nice things - like having meaningful conversations with T and Al for the first time over Valentine's day (singles) drinks. And there are nice things on the horizon - like going to India and Dubai for the whole month in March! This has been a learning experience in itself. I was all already to go by myself (I've now classified this as an official "gap year" experience and hence can justify spending the money) when the parents flipped out, and so humongous efforts have been made (and money will be paid) to make the arrangements as safe as possible for their peace of mind. (Really! *sighs* there was a point I almost gave up and just cancelled the tickets.) Last night, though, I was over the moon that it looks like some friends will be joining me in the end.
Hopefully, though, I'll still have time for myself to think about things that have happened. At this point I'm so confused about the work situation and being unhappy and emotionally "fragile" (as some people have said) that going away seems like such a necessary thing. Don't they say that God finds you in the wilderness? Perhaps the Rajasthan desert will suffice.
But there have been some nice things - like having meaningful conversations with T and Al for the first time over Valentine's day (singles) drinks. And there are nice things on the horizon - like going to India and Dubai for the whole month in March! This has been a learning experience in itself. I was all already to go by myself (I've now classified this as an official "gap year" experience and hence can justify spending the money) when the parents flipped out, and so humongous efforts have been made (and money will be paid) to make the arrangements as safe as possible for their peace of mind. (Really! *sighs* there was a point I almost gave up and just cancelled the tickets.) Last night, though, I was over the moon that it looks like some friends will be joining me in the end.
Hopefully, though, I'll still have time for myself to think about things that have happened. At this point I'm so confused about the work situation and being unhappy and emotionally "fragile" (as some people have said) that going away seems like such a necessary thing. Don't they say that God finds you in the wilderness? Perhaps the Rajasthan desert will suffice.
"From his fullness we have all received,
grace in place of grace,
because while the law was given through Moses,
grace and truth came through Jesus Christ." (Jn 1)
This being new year's eve, I guess as tradition goes it's time to reflect on the year past and look forward to the year ahead. At first glance this hasn't struck me as a particularly memorable or exciting year - not like the past 3 before this - it's been a year of constant work and perhaps some tiredness, but also a lot of learning. Here's counting the blessings, in no particular order:
1. Some wonderful people who've given such great friendship and support through the year, even when it was painful to do so - they should know who they are :)
2. New experiences: getting to go to Chicago / Cincinnati, Jakarta & Bintan, and the Philippines; attending conferences; meeting new people and becoming less scared of them.
3. Being challenged to fail and grow and accept and be humble in my various work assignments. I'll probably remember this year as the closest I've come so far to a breakdown - but also for all the growing that happened through it. If I may say so, I've learnt to accept failure better, come to know the value of honesty / assertiveness, and have more courage to do things that are difficult (like having sensitive conversations) but that I think should be done. I've also realised that I'm more confident of being able to do things and less wary of what other people may think... but that's a line that should not be pushed too far and I'm still learning where that should be.
4. Some moments that truly made me realise what I'm working for. Surprisingly, they are actually the very painful, low points when pride and pretensions and all the attractive things are stripped away and you have to ask yourself "why am I really doing this?"
5. The current situation, which has made me realise how deeply I care about the people I work with and for - my team and our students who never cease to amaze me. As CR and V say, this might be a setback... but I'm sure there will be beautiful things that come out of it, whatever happens. Perhaps bittersweet will be the flavour of the next few months.
Here, a short observation - I went to Joy's house the other day (it was like going back in time! I even went into the lift and instinctively hit "7" before I remembered she lived on the 4th floor) for a Christmas party with TC. Joy and Victor are still leading it, and Jul and David turned up later, but the rest of the group were in the 16 - 19 range and I felt terribly old. But it was great seeing how strong the group is growing and how many of them are the same faces from last year. Young people need safe places for them to grow - TC was that for me - and I'm so pleased to see that it still is for so many. It's amazing how safe environments and encouragement can challenge people to go further. W's work with XY and Rachel's work with the current CJ*C exco is no less than amazing.
So, that's what I'm grateful for - a lot! This coming year will be one of change - getting out of what's become my comfort zone, and hopefully learning to give more humbly and selflessly. Am also looking forward to more intellectual challenge that comes with changing fields (again!) and reading more widely. Welcome 2012!
grace in place of grace,
because while the law was given through Moses,
grace and truth came through Jesus Christ." (Jn 1)
This being new year's eve, I guess as tradition goes it's time to reflect on the year past and look forward to the year ahead. At first glance this hasn't struck me as a particularly memorable or exciting year - not like the past 3 before this - it's been a year of constant work and perhaps some tiredness, but also a lot of learning. Here's counting the blessings, in no particular order:
1. Some wonderful people who've given such great friendship and support through the year, even when it was painful to do so - they should know who they are :)
2. New experiences: getting to go to Chicago / Cincinnati, Jakarta & Bintan, and the Philippines; attending conferences; meeting new people and becoming less scared of them.
3. Being challenged to fail and grow and accept and be humble in my various work assignments. I'll probably remember this year as the closest I've come so far to a breakdown - but also for all the growing that happened through it. If I may say so, I've learnt to accept failure better, come to know the value of honesty / assertiveness, and have more courage to do things that are difficult (like having sensitive conversations) but that I think should be done. I've also realised that I'm more confident of being able to do things and less wary of what other people may think... but that's a line that should not be pushed too far and I'm still learning where that should be.
4. Some moments that truly made me realise what I'm working for. Surprisingly, they are actually the very painful, low points when pride and pretensions and all the attractive things are stripped away and you have to ask yourself "why am I really doing this?"
5. The current situation, which has made me realise how deeply I care about the people I work with and for - my team and our students who never cease to amaze me. As CR and V say, this might be a setback... but I'm sure there will be beautiful things that come out of it, whatever happens. Perhaps bittersweet will be the flavour of the next few months.
Here, a short observation - I went to Joy's house the other day (it was like going back in time! I even went into the lift and instinctively hit "7" before I remembered she lived on the 4th floor) for a Christmas party with TC. Joy and Victor are still leading it, and Jul and David turned up later, but the rest of the group were in the 16 - 19 range and I felt terribly old. But it was great seeing how strong the group is growing and how many of them are the same faces from last year. Young people need safe places for them to grow - TC was that for me - and I'm so pleased to see that it still is for so many. It's amazing how safe environments and encouragement can challenge people to go further. W's work with XY and Rachel's work with the current CJ*C exco is no less than amazing.
So, that's what I'm grateful for - a lot! This coming year will be one of change - getting out of what's become my comfort zone, and hopefully learning to give more humbly and selflessly. Am also looking forward to more intellectual challenge that comes with changing fields (again!) and reading more widely. Welcome 2012!
