Fisher Price- My FiRsT bLoG

Note: This post is dedicated to Anh- a stronger man for his family than I could even strive to be- who shared one of the craziest 2-3 month (it was supposed to be 1) adventures of my life with me.

So for those of you who don't know, I am in India volunteering at a wildlife NGO/animal shelter. I came 2 weeks ago for a little travel time and am leaving on a train in a couple hours to go the city I will work in.

Let me start backward with an aside about this train. About 4 hours ago, I was reading Gandhi's autobiography, which I picked up at the Gandhi museum in Bombay. I just finished the part about when he was taking a train in South Africa and was told to go to 3rd class even though he had a 1st class ticket, just because he was a "coolie" (South African derogatory name for Indians back in the day). My man refused and was kicked off the train...So I get on my scheduled train and find my seat and there's a guy in it. I ask him is seat number and he says it is the same as mine. I show him my ticket and he says my ticket is a waiting list ticket and I have to take a different one. Turns out he was just lying to me because he wanted to sit with his family, I guess. I'm not saying it was just because I was a foreigner, but.....We'll get to that later. The very kind station master reserved a seat for me on this later train, which arrives at 4 AM instead of 9 PM.

India is very big so these two weeks haven't been enough time to get to the real attractions of India that I would've wanted to see- like the "pink" and "blue" cities in Jaiphur and Jodphur and a kind of obscure temple with 20,000 sacred rats running around. I'd like to visit the rat temple because I think it would help me conquer my instinctual squeamishness about rats.

Here are some really generalized first impressions. I have been to Bombay, Calcutta, and a couple national parks which weren't too impressive as the really endangered animals didn't show their faces. Guess that's because they're endangered?

1) India is not so crowded as I imagined with a billion people. It's just that people live everywhere. There were some villages I passed when going through one of the national parks. In the saddest slum I have ever seen- one of the, if not the, biggest in the world, people's sideboard and corrugated iron walk-in closet sized shacks were stacked 2 high.

2) The amount of vehicles and craziness of traffic makes up for the feeling of some space. When I'm in a cab, I keep my eyes open because I want to know how to best throw myself out of the vehicle should we hit another. Taking long distance buses are even crazier. There are no four lane highways. Vehicles are constantly playing chicken to pass each other in the face of oncoming traffic. Crossing the street is like playing Frogger drunk. When the little man is red at the intersection, New Yorkers inch into the street to see when they can dart across. Here, the little man doesn't correspond with the actual stoplights. People kind of amble into traffic to make the cars slow down or swerve around them to cross. I am dreading leaving this internet cafe in 15 minutes because it's now dark and I have to cross. Their vehicles can't really hit more than 45 mph if that's any consolation.

3) I've been to many countries in Asia where being white means you are pegged as a foreigner right away. The status of the white devil differs in different places, but that would be a dissertation and has no place here. Overall there seems to be a higher percentage of Indians who are rude to me than in other countries. When walking down the street in smaller cities, I get stared at up and down. This happens everywhere in Asia, but here it's more intense and they don't stop looking. It's like they want to see what the white man will do next. I almost went Joe Pesci the other day. This guy was just staring at me and I went up to him- much calmer than Pesci- and the conversation went something like this. Bear in mind that he didn't speak English, so all these lines are my own.
Me: Hi, Can I help you?
Me: Oh, you were looking at me so I thought you wanted something.
Me: Do you want to talk?
Me: Come on, don't look at me if you don't want something. It's rude.
Me: Have a nice night.

I'm entitled to a casual flip-out every now and then. But I think I need to hit this Gandhi book a little harder. I don't know if Indians are rude to each other because I can't overhear them. It's kind of a " if a tree fell in the forest" situation. But in the big cities, they do push you aside a lot when walking and have no regard for lines at ticket counters. Oh, and they have signs in places that say "No Spitting". People always hock away with hardly a glance if they're going to moisten someone. It's that red betel nut stuff, but also spitting the black globs out that form with tons of pollution, I think.

Well...I have some more things I'd like to say but I want to eat before this train so more later on the status of women and other hot topics.