Mangoes and Cheese

So, generally, I'm overflowing with clever and quaint Carrie-Bradshaw-anecdotes when I sit down to type my Blog. Well, in my head they're like Carrie Bradshaw. Though, today, as a great deal of time has passed since my last post, I'm struggling to find one outstanding significant event to write about.

The last two weeks in Nimdi were great. I hesitate typing the word "great" because it's such a weak adjective. Everything is great. But, how else can I summarize it? It was more extremes: extremely rainy weather, extremely tired, extremely craving cheese, extremely aware of the finite nature of my stay.

And due to that last extreme, I filled my days with as much as I could and filled my stomach with all of the bland village food it could handle. On one outing I visited a nearby dam, which was the pop-sui/homo-cide setting of the locals. Apparently, in the last year, seven people had been killed or killed themselves by jumping in the dam. Though, that aside, views of the Indian countryside are so comforting. Not comforting like "oh the soothing trees and grass and fields are therapeutic to my soul." Comforting like "this looks exactly like the Indian countryside I would have imagined." Something about substantiations of your imagination that are really comforting. Or gratifying.

Sitting on the dam, the group of boys I was with started to go through my wallet. (One might wonder how they got my wallet. Simply, they took it out of my pocket.)

In Nimdi, there's no concept of private or personal. These people have so little that more-or-less everything is communal. Other than a toothbrush and one pair of clothes, everything is shared. So when people (and I deliberately say people and not kids) want to see something, they just take it. This is a particularly jarring gesture; especially when the thing they're grabbing is your camera. They can't really break an iPod or a book. But my camera---definitely breakable.

So, with my wallet peeking out of the opening of my pocket, Kamlendra (an exceptionally annoying twenty year old who repeatedly demands that I aid him in aquiring an American Visa) grabbed it. He went through the rupee bills. He took out the Bank Card and my health insurance card. A MetroCard for the New York City subway. And then he came across a picture.

I cringed. Oh God. How am I going to explain this?

The picture was one of my friend Carrie. (Not Bradshaw. Another one.) And this wasn't a photo of Carrie at her graduation party, or her 23rd birthday party. No, this was a glamour shot of Carrie taken when she was about 13 years old. Last summer, rummaging through our common friend Elly's room, I was fortunate enough to become the owner of this treasure.

The smokey lens filter. The shoulder-length feathered sienna hair. The bangs. The hand-sewn sequin and rhinestone blazer---boasting a design based on the early-nineties' penchant for repeated triangles and rectangles. Carrie's left hand grabbing her left lapel as if to say, "Do you see this jacket? Do you know who I am?" Her right earing, (the left being covered by a sweep of locks) an echo of the high-fashion jacket; two giant adjacent triangles: both lined with pewter and filled with fabulous (and I mean fabulous) clear rhinestones (though most would mistake them for flawless classic cut diamonds). The airbrushed foundation and the #25 Mystery lip colour (that's color with a u). And the eyes---the eyes outlined in a distinguished black mascara. The eyes which tell us this is no ordinary girl. This is no normal thirteen year old. She is mature. She is, yes, glamourous.

Kamlendra immediately started to laugh. The kind of laugh that says, "You're embarassed because I found a picture of your girlfriend and I'm going to make fun of you and harass you until you tell me all of the details."

"No! No, you don't understand. She's like my sister," I insisted.

"How old is she?"

"She's like 24."

"When was this picture taken?"

"Oh I don't know. When she was 12 or 13. At least 10 years ago."

[Expressions of disbelief and incredulousness.]

"Impossible! It can't be! This girl is at least 21!"

"Many girls do this in America. When they turn 13, they go to a professional photographer and get dressed up to take a bunch of pictures. It's for fun," I explained. "Her name is Carrie."

[Laughter.]

"What?" I asked, confused.

I failed to notice that Carrie's name, phonetically pronounced kai-ree, means "ripe mango" in Hindi.

Suffice to say that news of "Niral's ripe American mango" traveled around the village with astonishing speed. It wasn't long before kids were frequently taunting me with mangoes: juggling them, tossing them in my direction, asking me what the difference between American and Indian mangoes is.

___

Classes for the last two weeks took place during the kids' regular school hours. Nishant and I dropped the primary section and taught two 1.5 hour blocks during school: one for 6th, 7th, and 8th class students, and one for 9th and 10th class students. With the latter, we focused on basic tenses and important pronouns and verbs (the bare essentials for English sentence formation). However, with the 6th, 7th, and 8th class students, we ditched our cirriculum (due to lack of interest in their part) and taught interesting things like "How a cell phone with GSM technology works" or "World Music" (where I played different genres of music from my iPod on borrowed speakers).

On my last day, the kids organized a cultural show where they performed traditional Rajasthani songs and dances. They also presented Nishant and I with gifts and words of thanks. It was a nice bookend to the time we invested in the school.

That night was tough. Knowing that we were leaving the follwing morning resulted in a long list of places and people to visit. When we returned back to our host family, I had a crowd of kids and adults alike wanting to hang out.

I had promised my neighbor that I would draw a mehandi (henna) design on her palm. So, as I talked to Nishant and the other assorted people in my room, I shaped dots and lines and curves from the open-ended tip of a mud-filled cone. Now, not to brag, but I got pretty good with the mehandi---and one by one, people started asking me to do their palms. Which is fine. But like, it takes at least half-an-hour to do a single palm with any kind of attention to detail.

Finally, after doing five people's mehandi (not counting the initials I painted on biceps and forearms in the minutes between palms), Rukmanji (my host mother) put her palm in my hand. It was 1 in the morning. Great. So I started painting: squeezing the mud into crescents and crosshatched paiselys.

Forty-five minutes later I finished. I started to say the "a" and "l" of the word "Alright." Alright, time to go to bed. Rukmanji turned her hand over indicating that she wanted me to paint the other side. Fine. You wake up at 5 in the morning to fetch fire-wood and wash the floors. Fine, if you want your mehandi painted, then I can stay awake a little longer to do it. Fine. You probably never get/got the chance to enjoy yourself---if you're enjoying this, then I can prolong it. What's "tired" anyway? Just a state of mind! Mehandi is fun! C'mon!

Twenty minutes later I finished. I started to say the "o" of the word "Okay." Okay, I'll need to put toothpaste on my eyelids if I'm planning on staying awake longer. Rukmanji gave me her other palm and said, "hathi!" (Elephant in Hindi). What to do? I can't say no to my host mother. But an ELEPHANT? Are you kidding me? I wouldn't paint an elephant if I didn't have to put toothpaste on my eyelids. But Fine. If she's having fun (and if the constant juvenile giggling and laughter is any indication, she is) then I can [pretend to] put toothpaste on my eyelids.

But I would NEVER paint an elephant.

Thirty minutes later I completed her other palm. She looked at her hands and said, "Bahut aichi hai." (Is very good!) She laughed (almost maniacally) and grabbed the cone from my hand and started to draw little dots in the few empty spaces I left. NO! What are you DOING? I left the empty spots for a reason! Why?!

It occured to me at that moment how much fun she was having. And though it had raced through my mind a few minutes before, I didn't quite grasp the concept. She really NEVER enjoys herself---her days are filled with numbing repetition of menial labor. She gathers wood and water. She cooks. She raises her children. She cleans. She sews. She launders clothes. Every day.

I smiled and stared. Nothing but a little girl painting mehandi with no rhyme or reason. A little 37 year old girl wildly squeezing mud onto her hands with a philosophy of "empty space means possible enjoyment lost."

We are desire driven animals. We are selfish. Even people whose actions may seem selfless are driven by the emotion they feel upon completing their selfless actions. And this is most apparent in people whose time is consumed by survival (i.e. collecting water and caring for youth).

It's difficult to articulate this. But this realization every individual's emotion driven psyche leads to an important question of life philosophy. Here's what I wrote in my journal about it:

People are so selfish. By nature. People just want more of everything. It's true anywhere you go. Here, EVERYONE, wants a piece of us. Everyone wants a piece of chocolate. If I've given them one, they want more. Everyone wants to see pictures: pictures of themselves. Rukmanji couldn't put my obvious need for sleep at 2:30 in the morning above her desire for more mehandi on her hands. (Really how is any of this different than of people in the United States?)

They can't control themselves. Everyone wants what they don't have. Always. Even the man, who seemingly has everything, wants something else. Our oppulent society breeds people who have most of their material needs (so we start wanting more---emotional experiences that might be considered valuable---love, volunteerism, spiritual enlightenment). I suppose that's where things get really sticky---because a tangible/material goal can be bought---it is certain. However, we can't design our emotional evolutions.

So, what? Is it best to limit our wants to the tangible? Or strive to erradicate"want"? Is that the point of life or enlightenment or something? Part of me (the aspiring Buddist) says that's exactly right. But another part of me says "Why fight what's natural? Listen to your body. Listen to your mind." Maybe we really are our own best doctors. So does that mean we accept our greedy natures? Or do we ignore our "wants"? I really don't know.

And of course, there's a difference between erradicating and ignoring [desires]. And, I don't know if either word is correct. I don't think there should be any effort involved in the "not wanting." You can't want to not want too much. Or at all. I'm confused.

Enjoy by indulging in sensual pleasures moderately?

Or discipline yourself to transcend desire for sensual pleasures?

I dunno. The first seems so "common-man" and the second sounds too Buddhist-wannabe/trying-to-hard.

And could I really give up constant indulgence in cheese?

What's the point of art if sensual pleasure is to be transcended? Unless the art fulfills some spiritual/emotional void.

Is tired really tired or a state of mind? I don't know. I'm too tired to think about it. So, for tonight, I'll give into my desire for the sensual pleasure of climbing into a
bed.

Sensually,
Niral

___

We left Nimdi the following morning. We led a literal parade of children on the route from our house, through the village, to the bus stand. But not without, first, making a stop at the school to say goodbye to our kids.

I can't say that it was heartbreaking. Because my heart didn't break. (As much as I might have wanted it to.)

But I can say it was surprising. To see the watery eyes and to hear the sobbing. Is our leaving really affecting you this much? Should I be reacting more? No. How I react is how I react. There's no questioning the unquestionable.

One girl gave me a small envelope made of notebook paper and tape. It said "I forget me not." Well, at least they learned English...

We walked away from the school. Hundreds of kids waving goodbye. Dozens crying. Wow it's over.

A cargo bus from town was going to Bhindar, where we would have our farewell ceremony. We would hitch a ride. I jumped into the passenger seat, throwing my backpack in first. I turned and looked out the open window. There were the faces that filled my days for five weeks. Ashok and Jitu. Piyush and Vinay. "Bye sir."

Bye.

And that was it.

Whatever restlessness I felt before I came to India. It was gone. I had lost myself somewhere in the past couple of years. And somewhere in the past five weeks, 10,000 miles away from where I was lost: I found myself again.

And the best part: none of this was magical. This wasn't some lame self-proclaimed spiritual journey through the hidden mystical countryside of India. It was a person who got caught up in self-indulgence. A person whose idle mind got the best of him.

That person moved away from his life. Gained perspective. Got better.

And that was it.

Why

This week was rough. It seems that everything I write starts with a sentence that references the heat.

It is so hot.

So, I suppose, as with anything, the middle is the hardest. This week I've been having feelings of boredom, feelings that I'm not really providing a service that's truly needed, feelings of apathy in the classroom. This is summer break for most Indian kids and many of our students were just visiting family in Nimdi. Most schools start on July 1st, so we lost about a third of our students (and will lose more after this weekend).

My advanced section went from fifteen to five. That's particularly irritating because I made fifteen copies of dozens of vocabulary lists and stories---and now that will all go to waste.

On Wednesday morning, I woke up and went to our bathing room (which is really a tiny room measuring no more than 6 feet in height, 3 feet in width, and 3 feet in length). I collected my toiltetries and placed them on a stack consisting of my towel, a clean shirt, clean shorts, and clean underwear. I walked to the "bathing room". Once inside, I leaned down to put my toiletries on the floor and my 16.9oz Aveda Gel Cleanser (a beautiful green glass bottle) rolled off my stack of clothes and shattered on the stone floor.

(I have an obsession with products. I know it's ridiculous to carry a giant class bottle of gel cleanser while traveling through India---but I'm unnecessarily crazy about taking good care of my skin and hair.)

So I stared at the pile of shattered glass. And 14 fluid ounces of liquid soap.

Why?

Why?

Why?

Wait...

WHY?

I put down what was in my hands and I immediately resigned to the fact that I was going to have to clean up this mess. I I walked back to my room and got some garbage bags and started cleaning up the translucent green shards. Naturally (natural because Murphy's Law should be renamed Niral's Law), my doubled plastic bag tore and I had to get several new ones.

My host mother noticed me crouching in front of the bathing room and quickly shooed me away. She was worried I would hurt myself with the glass and wanted to make sure no one would slip on the soap. So she took a jadu (a small broom made of thin sticks) and swept the stone floor until most of the soap residue had disappeared. The only evidence that remained was a molehill of suds by the drain.

I went returned to the bathing room (which now smelled really pungent and sharp from the excessive soap spillage). I brushed my teeth. I washed my hair. And then I did something I haven't done in years. I washed my face with normal soap. NORMAL SOAP. I'm going to have terrible skin forever. When I go to the dermatologist in twenty years he's going to be like a botany expert studying tree-rings. He'll say, "Wow, you were doing really well until...hmm...let's see here...until you were about 22 or 23. Woah. What happened here? You would have perfect skin now if you didn't mess it all up by using normal soap."

After my bath I had some chai (which smelled a little funny to me). I went to my first section. Absolutely terrible---the kids were totally unmanageable and I had no energy to deal with them. Nishant and I returned home for our lunch and I was force fed okra, cucumbers, chach (whey with water and salt), and chopati. As soon as I ate, I could sense that something was wrong with my body.

I returned to school and sat through most of the intermediate section feeling a little light-headed. At 12:30pm I was feeling sick---no question. I laid down and tried to take a brief nap. But, I started to feeling a compounding nausea---which resulted in me running out to the field adjacent to our school and throwing up.

(I'll save you the suspense. I had some kind of food poisoning.)

As in most cases of food poisoning, the body's response is to expel all things in the digestive tract---as all of it could be the carrier for the pathogen/parasite. So, naturally (natural because biology is natural) I started to feel pressure in my bowels. Being about a kilometer away from home, I knew I only had one option.

Poop in a field.

POOP IN A FIELD. That's fine. Pooping in a field is completely fine. It's just like---really? Has it come to this?

So I found a tree. I dropped my shorts. And I pooped in a field. (Actually, I've written an extensive journal entry about this---but I'll spare this blog the details).

Feeling a little better---having thrown up AND pooped in a field, I went back to the school and asked Nishant if he could handle the advanced section alone. He said he'd be fine---so I walked back home (in 115 degree heat). I wanted to go to bed, but it was way too hot. So, I just read A Million Little Pieces by James Frey with about fifty of my little fly friends. Terrible.

I could tell that my body was trying to smoke whatever I had out of me. I had a headache---the kind of headache that you only get from having a high fever. So I took some Ibuprofen with water.

Within fifteen minutes I vomited the rest of what was in my stomach in a projectile manner. But just as before, I felt great.

Read. Refuse Food and Water. Read. Too hot to read. Read. Sleep. Too hot to sleep. Read. Refuse Food and Water. Refuse Food and Water.

Finally, I was feeling too dehydrated to NOT drink water---so in the smallest servings, I started drinking water. Word of my illness spread through the village quickly. Consequently, my entire afternoon was highlighted by visits from my students. Which is sweet in theory. But it's not so sweet when they decide to stay for hours and talk and laugh and go through my things.

I can deal with that crap when I'm healthy---but not when I can't keep food down. I'll throw up on you bitch.

Evening came, and it started to rain. OF COURSE IT'S RAINING. In villages in India, when it rains, power companies cut all energy to prevent short circuiting and electric fires. Great. No ceiling fan. No light. Hundreds of insects. I'm so happy. No really. I'm SO happy.

I decided that a little fresh air and a phone call would serve me well. I went on the rooftop and got in touch with Suzanne. It was raining lightly and the sky was completely gray with clouds. The water on my neck felt good. The breeze felt good. Talking on the phone felt good.

Suzanne and I talked and talked. And I started to feel a little nauseous but didn't think anything of it. And in the middle of Suzanne's story of her trip to Chicago (which I was laughing at) I started to projectile vomit water (because that's all I had in my stomach). I'm not an easily phased person so I just let Suzanne talk and just briefly mentioned that I was throwing up. Suzanne continued telling her story. I continued laughing. I continued throwing up.

From a neighboring rooftop, one of my students saw me laughing, gagging, throwing up, and laughing again. She thought that something was wrong with me---so she screamed for my host family. Within seconds, my entire host family was on the roof watching me crouch in a corner talking on the phone with a smile on my face, laughing, gagging, throwing up, and laughing more.
So, it's not a question if they think I'm crazy. (Well I am crazy.)

The rest of the week was filled with rest and not too much teaching. My stomach is still weak. But I'm getting better.

As far as why I got sick. The elderly women in the village KNOW that I'm sick because I haven't prayed to Bhud Bauji (Holy Ghost Spirit). Outside of our school, there is a small shrine with a stone in it---apparently legend says that this stone, when buried under hundreds of stones, always finds its way to the top. Obviously, I think this is ridiculous so I don't acknowledge it. So apparently, Bhud Bauji is angry with me and has sent a spirit to inhabit my body.

Obviously ridiculous to me. Obviously why I got sick to them.

I was offered different treatments like sooey (or an injection). An INJECTION?! What kind of village is this? What's the syringe made of? A hollow stick? Hate it. Also, my host mother offered to call the witch doctor and have him treat me. I said "No thanks. Maybe if I'm still sick tomorrow."

Why I think I got sick? I think when my host mother was cleaning the bathroom floor with the jadu---she got some soap water on my toothbrush. Even in America, I clean the head of my toothbrush before I use it---so nothing was different when I brushed my teeth that morning. But I think maybe a couple rubs with my thumb under running water didn't cut it this time. I think that the dirt off that floor is enough to get anyone sick.

Anyhow, what got me really thinking was my glass bottle and why it broke. This is what I wrote in my journal:

It's so true that people say "things happen for a reason" to make themselves feel better. My glass bottle shattered by chance because I dropped it by mistake. I HIGHLY doubt there was any subconscious workings involved. I go to thinking in the shower---soap is soap. Why do I pay so much for face wash? I mean preventative Kiehls makes sense to me. But face wash? I thought this event would make me realize that expensive face wash was not necessary for my
survival.

But then, I though more, and realized this is just our mental justification for bad things happening. If such-and-such never happened then we wouldn't be in [our current situation]. WELL OBVIOUSLY. I think it's best to stay away from the fate argument...

but...as I write this I'm torn---I want to believe that our lives are guided by events. Maybe the glass bottle DID break for a reason---to tear me from my material attachments. Or maybe, it didn't happen for any reason at all---

And MAYBE I needed an excuse to go/believe in a direction I'm naturally (natural because it's in-my-wiring) magnetized towards.

Fate or no fate? I think it's hard to say. But TRULY not believing in any kind shape form of fate is so empty. I know that I don't believe in every second of every day being predestined. But so many things are out of our hands (in this case literally...).

I think maybe our lives are guided by events---it's our choice to do or take what we want with/from them. Maybe every situation is an opportunity to learn from or change yourself.

Why do we always need a reason? Why do we always have to ask why?

Why do we always have to ask why? I don't really even know why we ask the why. But I know the why rarely matters.