the hussy of ahmedabad

So Ahmedabad, and I think Gujarat over all, is a really morally conservative state. I think I've mentioned that alcohol is prohibited out of respect to Gandhi since he was from this state. When I first moved in with my roommates, they told me that we weren't allowed to have guys stay the night at our flat, and it doesn't really matter who they are what relationship there is, just no guys. They said if we did, everyone would find out about it and it would be difficult for us to find another flat in the future. I didn't give it much thought at the time; I didn't think it would be a problem. I was somewhat shocked, when watching a Hindi film, that a young guy and girl started living together in her flat. But my friends said, that's in Bombay, you can do anything there.

Well, now I've started dating a guy from my Hindi class. He is from Iraq which is apparently more liberal than most of us Americans think and apparently a lot more liberal than this area. I really didn't know what to expect when we started talking. I assumed most women would wear the burqa or some other kind of conservative muslim covering, but he says some women may wear a head scarf to cover their hair, but otherwise they wear western clothes similar to what we wear in the US. He says that about 80% of Iraqis wanted Sadaam gone and a lot of the remaining were affiliated with terrorists, so it seems most Iraqis aren't very angry at the US like I had anticipated. He says most areas of his country are pretty safe except for Anbar province to the east where terrorists come from the surrounding countries. But he blames the media in the US and Iraq for depicting each other inaccurately.

So earlier, Haider lived in a muslim area in the old city. There was a big muslim holiday Mushara near his flat where there was a big parade with big floats. This went late into the night, and as his flat was far from mine, he suggested I stay there overnight. Since he has lived alone in Ahmedabad, I don't think he was as aware as the no opposite sex staying overnight rule. I asked if he was sure it was ok, he said yes, so I stayed. Well, a few days after that his landlord, who stays above him, that I couldn't stay overnight or Haider would have to leave. The landlord said this was because of his kids...right...because little kids are so observant of this kind of thing..

So Haider decided he would leave, for a number of reasons, so he found a flat in the new city, closer to his university. One night after staying out late for dinner and a movie, we came back to his place. As it was getting late, he suggested I stay there for the night. I asked if it would be ok with his landlord; he didn't know but decided he'd deal with that later. So now, the last time I went to his flat, it was around 10 pm and we just stopped to pick up something, his landlord who lives above was looking down from her balcony, said something in Gujarati that I could not stay the night. So that is how it is here, and now after my roommates' initial warning, I've experienced it first hand here. But as I've said, it is particularly conservative here. Other parts of the country are not like this, but I suppose some may be worse as well.

Mumbai 18-22.1.10

I recently found out that one of the original planners of Gandhinagar was still alive; this was really exciting since I had thought there was only one main planner, H.K. Mewada, who had died years ago. Apparently there was another man, Prakash Apte, who also planned the city. Why did it take me 4 months to figure this out, you ask? Yeah, I don't know. One of my professors just happen to mention it and that there had been an article written about this guy in the paper. To track him down, I had to find the article, go to the newspaper office several times, try repeatedly to call the reporter who had written the story, until finally I met him at his office and he gave me Apte's contact information.

In contrast to Deepa Mewada, H.K. Mewada's son, Apte seemed very interested in talking about Gandhinagar. The reporter sent me several papers that Apte had written about it, so I was very excited to speak with him. Since he now lives in Mumbai, I arranged to go and speak with him there. It also gave me a chance to visit my old roommate, Arpita; after her research project finished here in Ahmedabad, she moved back with her parents in Mumbai.

Arpita's dad works for the central government in the dept. of atomic energy, so they live in a flat in a building just for employees of this dept. It's such a nice flat though! In the posh Malabar hill area, at the top of the hill, so the view of Mumbai is amazing. And they live near two big gardens. The whole family is there together now- Arpita's older brother and his wife are living there too. They are pregnant and due in just a few weeks. Here the woman gets 6 months of maternity leave! Really makes you realize how behind the US is! And of course, I can't forget their cocker spaniel, Bruno. He is quite the character and definitely spoiled and well-loved! My pill bottle has his teeth marks on it now! hahaha

We walked down along the sea front to the parks there one night. Another day we went to the Prince of Wales museum which has such nice indian art. The Rajasthani miniature paintings made me laugh. Half of them were of women wandering around in the woods singing of their lovers who were away, by looking at these you would have the impression that the indian woods were full of lonely women trailed by wild animals.

Then the other paintings were of couples. Each was a different month of the year, and the captions progressed - each month said 'the lover should not leave his beloved during this month', the next 'the lover would be crazy to even think about leaving the house this month' so I'm not sure if there was a time when he could leave. I guess they were just supposed to have 'fun' indoors the entire year... ;)

McDonalds Translated

It's interesting how a thing's meaning can change from one place to the other.

McDonald's for example. In the US, McDonald's means cheap and fast food. It's not nutritious; it's for people who are busy and don't have time to go somewhere else. Or ok, yes for people who want some greasy fast-food.

In India, eating at McDonalds seems to be somewhat of a status symbol - such a different concept of what McDonalds is in the US - where McDonald's is just a fast, cheap place to eat when you're in a hurry. You only see upper-class people eating there in India because here it's not cheap like it is in the US. You can get really cheap street food for maybe Rs 10 or you can even go to an adequate sit-down restaurant for Rs 100 and be waited on and have a nice, full meal with roti, curry, rice, etc. Or you can go to McDonalds and pay Rs 100 for a value meal. So why do Indians go there when the food is not that great and the price is definitely not great? I think it's mostly this status symbol.

But I've been thinking a lot lately about things I'd like to do at home, for some reason. In the whole 5 months I haven't really thought much about it. Now I find myself thinking about Taco Bell. The other day I could have sworn I smelled the coffee smell from the shop in Eastland Mall. Just walking around the mall sounds really appealing. Or getting a bit wet on a cool, rainy day. So I've been going to McDonalds more often lately...

a bit nepali living

One of the best things about staying with friends in a different country is getting to experience the culture more authentically. My friend, Gaurab and his wife and son have a joint family and live in the same house with his parents.

It was really interesting because his wife, Dharti, was telling me some of the difficulties of living in a joint family. The mother-in-law is in charge and teaches the daughter-in-law how to run the house, and then it is her responsibility. To show respect to her in-laws, the wife shouldn't be seen in her sleeping clothes, so Dharti made sure to get up and change in the morning before her in-laws came downstairs.

There are so many signs of respect and signs of showing that a woman is married there. She must wear glass bangles (if she breaks them, it is bad luck for her husband, as a woman breaks her bangles when her husband dies), she will wear a string of small glass seed beads, bindi, nose piercing, and also red clothes are a sign of being married. The women have bangles, necklace, and sweater to match all their different salwar kameez.

Because Katmandu is a poor country and especially rural life is difficult. Kids can't go to school because transportation issues in the mountains and such, so Gaurab's family had taken in two boys. The boys live with them so they can go to school in the city, in exchange for cooking and cleaning. There is an older boy, Anil, 18 and the younger, DilKumar, who is 12, but I thought was around the same age as Gohan. He's a little guy! Gohan and Dil were playing all the time, at first Gohan was shy but by the end, they kept asking me to come play with them after I taught them "Red Light, Green Light."

Power cuts are a problem in Nepal; they said they are without electricity for six hours or more a day, so they have a generator, but usually only use it to power lights, and they had two sets of lights. One had bulbs that were dimmer but used less power, and the other brighter for when they had power. You would be driving down the street and suddenly all the lights would go out! Houses aren't heated like ours are - and it was pretty cold when I was there - at least at night and in mornings it was probably near freezing. They heated water by a solar heater on the room, but still I could only bring myself to bathe every other day!

To Nepal

So I finally took my first overnight train! If I had flown from Ahmedabad to Delhi, I would have had to get a hotel overnight before I could get a flight to Kathmandu, so instead I took an overnight train and reached Delhi a few hours before the flight. I left Ahmedabad at 6 pm on Dec 31st and arrived in Delhi around 8 am Jan 1st, so I spent New Years on the train! I had almost forgotten it was New Year's Eve until I heard people saying "Gyara minutes....Dus minutes" in Hindi and finally realized they were counting down til midnight!

I took 3AC class on the train, so I get a sleeping birth. In the day there are just two benches faces each other for 6 people to comfortably sit, then at night, above they fold down like bunkbeds each side, so there are three beds on each side. They bring pillows and blankets and everything. Around 10pm we all folded down the beds. This train didn't have plugs, so i couldn't plug my computer unfortunately. They brought so much food before that though! First a plate with dhokla, some kind of idli - and I thought that was dinner. An hour or so later, they bring a plate with some breadsticks and then a cup of hot tomato soup. Then later, some chicken curry, rice, and daal, roti, and dahi with ice cream later for desert!

When I got to the Delhi airport I was walking near the gate to my flight and did a double take when I saw a girl wearing a Ball State T-shirt! She was a group from Anderson University doing some kind of trip looking at hospitals and medicine in the area!

Finally I reached Katmandu, but the process of getting a visa ended up a pain. I didn't take much cash because from previous experiences, some places will not exchange Indian Rupees into other currency, so I planned on getting money out of the ATM when I reached. However I needed $25 American Dollars in cash to buy the visa, and so didn't have enough rupees to even convert. So I had to leave my passport, go outside and find an ATM, so at least I met Gaurab and his wife Dorothy then, so they knew what was going on. But then I had to go back in and wait for a long time, the line was soooo long, and there were only 2 people giving visas!

There was a bandh in Kathmandu, which means most of the city was on strike, but luckily we found a cab. That evening we drove through the city a bit, and went to some of the old squares, saw the building where the living princess lives and the old palace. It was amazing architecture and what an amazing public space! There were many street vendors selling lots of meat! "BEEF, PORK, RIBS,....vegetable medley" I had buffalo kebab that was amazing, and a samosa with chutney, and chicken sausage...sooooo good. I'll move to Nepal just for the meat! Then we came back and had dinner - rice and roti, chicken soup, spinich, beans, and chicken curry. Gaurab's family is very sweet, and their house is so nice! We stayed up for awhile talking about our projects, and they were telling me about life in Nepal and how things are changing. It's so nice to stay with friends when I travel places and to go with people who can tell you about the culture and show you interesting things! It makes the experience much more enjoyable! And I'm lucky to have such nice friends!

Kolkata

Nov 16th -ish or somewhere thereabouts..
So this post is a bit old and delinquent. On the same trip to Jamshedpur and Bhubaneswar, I also stopped in Kolkata. Nihal and I went to a new planned area called Salt Lake City which is kind of an IT hub and a new, kind of high-end area. This area, too, was kind of divided up into 'neighborhood units' oriented kind of radially around a central area. The central area had a big mall that seemed pretty popular.
There was also a big park in the center, too, but unfortunately you had to pay to enter.

At this point it was already getting late, so I opted to go see Victoria Memorial. I had hoped to see more of the actual old city, but just didn't end up having enough time. The memorial is this big, white building which is now a museum; the building is inside a big park in the city. What was most interesting to me was how people were using this park.

There was a main walkway terminating at the memorial and on either side were park benches. Each bench was occupied by one, or two at most, couples. Even in the big cities here, I haven't seen much public display of affection, and especially not in more-conservative Ahmedabad. However, at this park there were even a few couples making out, in public! Oh, the brazenness..hahahah. But seriously, PDAs are so rare here that I still do a double take if I see a couple holding hands - and most of the time these couples are married. Also considering the fact that it seems the majority of young indians live with their parents until they marry, and then even after sometimes, they don't have their own place for ..romantic meetings. So the fact that this park has become the place for that is really interesting.

One of the best parts of Kolkata was that I stayed with some friends I had known from CEPT, Saikat and Vibha. Apparently Saikat had liked Vibha right away in school, but she always thought he was just a friend, so they remained good friends during their masters until he finally proposed. They are such a cute couple! Apparently though they are of different castes, Vibha is a higher caste Brahmin, and it took some convincing of her parents to allow the marriage. Now they live with Saikat's parents in Kolkata which has taken some getting used to for Vibha. She comes from central india and so doesn't speak Bengali. She is also veg only, while Saikat and his family, as many Bengalis are, eat non-veg.

But anyway it was great seeing them again after so many years. They showed me the video of their wedding. And I had some nice home-cooked shrimp!

APSA conference and Gandhinagar presentation

CEPT just hosted the biennial Asian Planning Schools Association (APSA) conference from Nov. 24th-26th. Nihal had suggested I present something, so I submitted an abstract about my research thus far on Gandhinagar.

I didn't realize how big of a conference it was going to be; there were a lot of international planners there. CEPT actually extended its semester to allow students to take time off to help with the conference. They set up several big tents in the cricket fields next to CEPT's campus and put down big mats on the ground for the whole event.

For the break-out sessions in the conference, there were several panel themes - sustainability was a big topic, also housing, infrastructure, planning education, and maintaining modern and traditional (which I presented under).

One of the most interesting presentations for me was Tridib Banerjee's keynote; he teaches at University of Southern California. He spoke about politics of space, spoke briefly on gender on space, and on how to define public/private space. His presentation noted some of the interesting uses of space that I have been noticing in India like the many informal, small temples on the road side. He also brought up an interesting point on how public space can become private and vice versa because of technology. People can be in a public plaza but having very private conversations through the internet on their laptops. At the same time, private spaces like your house, can become public when speaking on online forums or doing teleconferencing.

There was also an interesting discussion on a UNESCO presentation. We were questioning how to define what to preserve and whose heritage they were preserving. Is it only the heritage of the upper class and only monuments, and is this relevant? Are they upper class interested in preserving their 'heritage' which happens to be the old city where people are still living, often poorer people and how will the preservation affect them? Should they only be preserving monuments or are there other ways/things to preserve. Is there a way to preserve a living heritage? I brought up the example of Konark Sun temple. It is a UNESCO site, but it is not a living heritage because the temple is no longer used. There are no longer idols in the temple, and it is no longer used for its original purpose. Is there a way to preserve these places and also allow people to still use these spaces more spontaneously rather than just as a museum and to acknowledge that the use of a space can change over time? But by gating them and charging an admission, you omit lower classes being able to use these spaces. So it was a very interesting discussion.

The conference was a really good opportunity to meet a lot of other planners, so I really enjoyed meeting a lot of people. I wasn't so happy with the way my presentation went, however. I was the last presenter in a panel of 5, so we each were supposed to have 15 minutes to present. However a sixth presenter was added at the last minute, and the earlier presenters took up more time than they were supposed to, so I had maybe 10 minutes to present. I presented under the Modern and traditional theme. Most moderators of panels simply helped engage discussion at the end of the presentations. However our moderator decided it was his duty to say which presentations were relevant or not which I don't think was his role at all. Apparently mine was not relevant to the theme... and because I said at the beginning that mine was a work in progress, the moderator thought it wasn't yet worth commenting on. He also chewed out a masters thesis student who presented his work who had unfortunately presented on an area that the moderator was quite familiar with.

But anyway in my presentation, I talked about the similarities and differences between the two cities. Both cities were planned as purely administrative, post independence capital cities and both separated land use functions into zones. The neighborhood unit was the central building block for the plans of both, and both had and 4 level hierarchy of commercial development. Some of the differences are the locations of different land uses in each city; the location of the capital complexes and industrial areas are especially different. Also the size of the neighborhood unit was reduced in Gandhinagar; the large size of the unit had been criticized a lot in Chandigarh. Also the layout of the capital complex - while Ravi Kalia, the author of the main book on Gandhinagar, says its capital complex is a complete failure, I completely disagree. I think it is much more successful than Chandigarh's because it is better incorporated into the city. It is highly visible and all the roads draw vehicles in towards it. The design creates a vista and entry with a wide street separated by a nicely maintained linear park while Chandigarh's capital complex is difficult to locate, is very out-of-the-way, and its famous Corbusier buildings are not even visible from the street. One of the biggest differences is citizens' perceptions of the cities. While people are proud of Chandigarh, people don't want to live in Gandhinagar.