So yesterday I went to SEWA – an NGO – self employed women’s association. Fulbright encourages us to volunteer and give back while we are here, so I emailed them and they called me right away. I wasn’t there very long – the woman just wanted to know when I was available and what my experience was in be able to best utilize me. I was there maybe 15 minutes… she said she’d call me back when they found something, so we’ll see. My roommate Arpita has some other suggestions for NGOs I could help with, so we’ll see.
Let me just say that among the great things I’ve experienced already, CEPT is a huge frustration right now. They have wi-fi, but it is so hard to do anything because you are constantly losing connection. Caryn and I have gotten really frustrated with this, especially because the wireless at IIM was so superb. Even Nihal, who is generally unflappable, was aggrevated today. Perhaps even more aggravating is the library. I know in a different country you just have to adapt and not question things sometimes, but with the library it’s really difficult. I had been waiting for about a week for my library card, and so finally got it. Now, you can’t take any bags in the library at all which is a bit inconvenient, but ok, not a huge deal, right? Ok, well instead I take in a 3-ring binder where I write my notes. The first time, the librarian followed me and had to look at it to check and see if it was ok to bring in, but she let me. Then later I came back in, and they saw that I had some copies from books back home. Well apparently you can’t bring in any copied material…what am I going to do with?? Really? Seriously? I just don’t get it, it seems such an odd thing to get worried about. Ok, and then I’m searching their database online, and unfortunately it seems like almost the only things related to my research are thesis projects. Oh, and did I mention the thesis books are all kept locked up in cabinets? Yeah, so anytime you want to see them, you have to give them your library card, sign out for them, and they have to go unlock them for you. You can’t check them out at all. What are they so worried that people will do with them?? I have no clue, and the librarian barely speaks English, so I can’t ask her..which seems odd since most of the books are in English…It’s so hard to understand; if they are worried about people stealing books, why would people steal theses instead of published books? It’s really baffling and sooo frustrating, but anyway, enough with my library ranting. Back to positive things.
So today was the last day of the Ganesh festival, and so they take all these Ganesh statues to the river and put them in. There were all these processions of people with drums and in trucks with these statues. Ellis bridge was actually closed so that they could use it for the processions. There were tons of people in the river with the statue and on the banks dancing as well. Caryn and I went up on the bridge to best see everything. There were several cranes because some of the statues were so big that they picked them up with cranes and lowered them to the river. Camels were pulling these big trucks with statues maybe even 10 feet tall. Two guys went down with it to push it in. There were so many people, and we, the two white girls, were quite the spectacle. It got pretty overwhelming actually. Girls came up wanting to take their picture with us, and all these people wanted to shake our hands. Many people were throwing these colored powders, and they took great pleasure it covering us with it as well. Throwing it at us was fine, but then guys started rubbing it on our faces. At one point we were surrounded by all these young guys wanting to know where we were from and all that, wanting to shake hands. It was too much so we left. One guy in particular kind of kept following us, so we hopped in a rickshaw and got out of there. My face, chest, and hair were covered in the powder. The blue especially – I don’t know if it will come out of my shirt!
We went to dinner at this Mirch Masala place that was pretty cute. There was kind of a courtyard before you went in with this big fake tree in the middle. The inside kind of looked like a Mexican restaurant actually, but with all these Bollywood actors painted on the wall. The fact that many of them had these pencil-thin mustaches just added to the Mexican feel…but the food was still Indian. In the courtyard outside, there was a cake shop, Upper Crust, so we had a desert of chocolate cake there. We decided to go to Law Garden after that. It’s all these little street vendors selling really traditional clothes with elaborate embroidery and lots of mirrors. They say it’s a good place to get dresses for the upcoming Navratri festival. The vendors are shouting at you from all sides, and you have to bargain down with them. On the other side of the park were these little make-shift restaurants. There seemed to be a lot of Punjabi-Chinese carts but then there were all these tables, too so they were actually sit-down restaurants. It was pretty cool to see all these different people eating there at night and taking their walks at night in the garden.
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