Hampi: The Adventure Continues! (and other exciting but unrelated stuff!)

Dear America, Land of Snot that is Green, Left Handed Scissors, and Toilet Paper that I Don't Have to Ration and Trade like Cigarettes in a Minimum Security Prison,

I believe our story last paused with the promise of creepy mermaid babies, so in the style of an infuriating multiple episode TV special (i.e. Kurt and Blaine's will-they-won't-they relationship in TV's ridiculous, mildly nonsensical hit series Glee), I'm going to develop another plot (and probably leave it with a similarly infuriating cliffhanger) before continuing with cliffhanger at hand.

I have my first Human Rights test on Monday (maybe. I haven't actually seen the professor in a week or two, and he never announced the test in class, but it seems to be happening according to the vague powers of India). Human Rights, if you will remember, is one of the courses which required a month long Lord of the Rings quest to obtain the syllabus. I had originally thought that was going to be a Mordor-capital-letter-Q-Quest, but it turns out it was just a get-to-Rivendell-there-are-actually-still-two-and-a-half-movies-left-in-this-journey-including-elephant-fights-mini-quest, as after I did obtain the reading list I discovered that it encompassed not a list of 8 required readings paired with the lecture dates which would supplement my obscure-accented professor, but a list of a million bajillion "recommended reading," none of which were available in the library or the campus book store or the random book truck that sometimes parks outside of the campus shopping complex (Dear America, why don't we have book trucks?). Anyway, through an intensive search montage, I deduced that a few of the articles were available at the Center for Distance Education, an conveniently unlabeled academic building somewhere on campus. However, after another search montage I discovered that this was not the Center for Distance Learning that contained books. The cryptic man at the desk informed me that I would have to traverse to the Golden Threshold for that. Upon returning to my professor, the sage, Mr. Miyagi character (with equally veiled advice that only makes sense at the end of the movie and equally inscrutable accent) of this story, I found out that another book was more closely within my reach. His assitant would make a copy and I could pick it up tomorrow. So I temporarily abandoned Indiana Jones and the Gold Threshold, and returned the next day to find that the assistant was not there and that Mr. Miyagi would not be returning until the date of the maybe-test. With my new book title I ventured into town via 6 different forms of transportation, and checked 3 different major book stores, each deeper into the concrete/garbage/beautiful temples/amusingly mispelled English billboard jungle of Hyderabad. The third store finally had it. However, it did not have an cataloguing system so the two store employees procured it for me after half an hour of checking every single title of every shelf in the store. So I am now in possession of Amartya Sen's Argumentative Indian, a book that is not about human rights. But what will happen next for our hero? Will Mr. Miyagi ever return? Will the maybe-test actually occur? Will she ever obtain a book related to human rights?  Tune in next time!

Now on to the creepy mermaid baby. Unfortunately I couldn't get a picture because I was concerned that displaying it on the internet might have the same effect as a Gorgon, but here is the tapestry that was displayed next to the moonlit mermaid baby tapestry in the eating establishment my travel buddies and I went to in Hampi after our Hanuman mountain adventure:



I named the scary imp on the left, Strawberry. He is a vegan and uses yoga to levitate.

 Yes, friends, Hampi is hippy Mecca. Dreadlocked, silly Ali Baba pants sporting, "authentic wooden Indian flute that I bartered with a craftsman on the street corner for," drug induced spiritual journey having, foreigners lined the streets of Hampi, and it was glorious. (I do not mean to rip people having spiritual journeys and other backpackers. There were just too many stereotypes in one place). In addition to the creepy mermaid and psychedelic mushroom nymphs, the cafe also had a Dali tapestry, hammocks (each containing its own respective obscure instrument playing occupant emitting an array of different smokes), and the chillest of chill annoying hippy music with redundant guitar chords and lyrics about enlightenment. It was the best lunch ever. Unfortunately, after our morning of hiking through various hottest-part-of-the-days, two of my travel companions got sick from what we think was heat exhaustion. So I spent the rest of the day generally wandering and purchasing Ali Baba pants. (Ali Baba pants are the extremely silly, voliminous pants that people often associate with India because everyone in Alladin, which does not take place in India, wears them. I have never seen an Indian wear them, but merchants in Hampi know that tourists love them, and I must say, they rank pretty high on the delightful-o-meter.) Then next morning we had breakfast on our hostel's rooftop cafe, where the manager played one of his favorite Hindi songs, which repeats the same two lines 101 times. I know because I asked him. Then he played it again. My two travel buddies were still feeling sick, so just Travel Buddy Denise and I set out to see the rest of the temples. We talked to several of the rickshaw drivers on our walk down the road, who fondly remembered us as the girls who walk everywhere (because we're too cheap to take a rickshaw). Some little kids approached us, so we were talking to them, and then their parents came and invited us into this open building... which turned out to be a wedding. It was awesome. Everyone was really excited to see us, they fed us, they showed us around the adjoining temple, they were just generally super nice, and they even invited us to come back later for lunch.

Part of the wedding. Something with rice (I'm not really sure what. The people I asked only spoke Canada... that's the mother language of Karnataka, not our friendly neighbors to the north )

 So after that we saw checked out the rest of the temples, did more general wandering, purchased the world's tiniest bananas, and sat in one place for a very long time (this sounds like it would be really boring, but it's actually one of the best parts of traveling, especially when you are obviously foreign. So many people come up to talk to you. One of the traveling instrument salesmen, came up to me and started pulling every manner of random thing out of his magical Harry Potter bag, and when I told him I wasn't going to buy anything he stayed and talked to me about music anyway. Then showed me how to build this weird quacking ocarina instrument out of wax and a dried up plant rind.) So excellent trip, my only minor complaint being the ride home. We got an overnight bus. Whenever I book an overnight bus I always forget that I'm booking an overnight bus in India, which means that it is more than likely that the bus will have a very loud dying cockatoo horn which the driver beeps very often and unneccessarily.

Other news from this week: I finally found a frisbee team! They seem really cool, and there might be a tournament in Kodaicanal (the cloud city) in a few weeks, so I'm very excited. I jumped onto a rapidly accelating bus, the only proper way to enter a bus in India, so Operation Assimilate is going along nicely. Also, I like califlower now (I'm becoming different and worldly).

My Trip to "Hampi," A Beautiful Land that is Totally Real and Not Part of Some Weird Indian Truman Show

America, this week has been so action packed (my life can be described in the same words as the summary on the back of a B rated DVD) that I'm going to have to resort to list form again. I am currently staying up way past my Indian grandmother bed time (10 or 11pm... I've been calling myself Gladys this semester) because tomorrow my classes are cancelled yet again, except this time for a good reason. My Human Rights class was cancelled yesterday because my professor is mediating negotiations with the Orissa government about a kidnapping (I am now slightly more sympathetic that class gets cancelled so much and he still hasn't given us access to any of the reading material for the course). Also, the Telengana Action Committee has called another bandh on the city, which means that for the next 24 hours the city is on lock down because of the Telengana separatist movement. Serious stuff (I am safe). Actually, this post, the first half at least, is going to be less silly than usual, but hopefully still interesting. Otherwise skip down to Friday, my trip to Hampi, Land of SIlly Hippy Nonsense and Delightful Pants.

Monday: Immediately after class I caught a shared autorickshaw to the Safrani school. It's this really cool weaving school that employs widowed women and it's partnered with and funds an elementary school. I had talked to the woman in charge a week before (I can never figure out her name because its an unfamiliar Indian name that everyone says really fast, so I've just been calling her Nana in my head because she is a super sweet little old lady that constantly seems like she's about to offer you freshly baked cookies) and she had said they needed of tutors. Anyway, I show up ready to tutor, they plop me into a second grade class with a lesson plan and say, "Okay, teach now." ...Suprise! So for the next hour I taught capacity to a class of 25-30 Indian second graders. I think under normal circumstances, I would say that this was a pretty surreal experience, but I am literally phased by almost nothing after being in India for two months. I went back again yesterday and taught an English class, and it was delightful because the curriculum had a story about Kuchipudi dance and the glory of Andhra Pradesh, so I couldn't pronounce any of the long Indian names and the kids couldn't pronounce any of the English words.

Tuesday: There was this big women and rape culture discussion outside the library, so it was pretty exciting to finally get involved with some campus activity.

Wednesday: One of my stranger days in Hyderabad. I was supposed to visit an NGO (non profit organization) and basically just ask them what they do as the "big project" for one of my classes, but I've turned it into a field work assignment (because I am not a second grader, and I would actually like to get college credit for this course). So I went to this faith based HIV/AIDS clinic, and it was basically the coolest place ever. They provide counselling, and medical services, and HIV testing, and religious services for further emotional support, and they meet with pastors and community leaders to spread awareness and reduce stigma, and they visit schools and slum areas, and they provide child care, know all of their patients personally, send people visit patients regularly, deal with several other diseases and I think they also slay dragons and bandage wounded unicorns on the weekend. I stayed for like 6 hours and got to talk to a ton of people. I'm a huge fan of this organization. They use religion as a base for a support group, so they can provide confidential medical and emotional support.
Weird thing about privacy though. All the councilling and medical examinations happened in one giant room and all the walls were glass. I asked about it, and the doctor I talked to said that its a strategy to help reduce stigma and create a greater sense of community. He had me sit there through a bunch of check ups as people detailed all their extremely personal medical information (he even had me copy down a prescription) and no one seemed the least bit bothered that I was there. I'm not really sure if this is just the paradigm NGOs in India use or its a class thing, or an India thing, or something else entirely. American Privacy Jesse was super freaked out, but it seemed to work really well, and it really did seem like a tight knit community.

But now on to the sillier portion of our story: Hampi. The only way I can describe Hampi is if Disneyland tried to make an India wonderland theme park geared toward hippies and dinosaur lovers. It was, like, ... too super pretty and lush to be real. I am actually convinced that everything was made of plastic and all of the people were hired actors. I am also convinced that a pterodactyl was going to swoop down and pluck me out of the banana field we got lost in, but the director of this grand charade cut it out at the last second because he knew we were suspicious. I refuse to believe that Hampi is a real place.


Obviously not real.

Two of my travel buddies, Denise and Amanda, posing in front of what is obviously just a green screen of what is supposed to be the beautiful view from atop the mountain where Hanuman the monkey god and hero of the Ramayana was born... Sure it is.

That's right, Hampi. I'm wise to your tomfoolery. I know this is a Jurassic Park version of the Truman Show. Who looks stupid now?!

Friday: We arrived to "Hampi" (the elaborate movie set) on Friday morning after taking the overnight bus and then a local bus from Hospet. The bus ride was our first cue that something was amiss. Too many glorious super old, super beautiful temples combined with far too much picturesque scenery. But we decided to give the place the benefit of the doubt. Our hostel, a delightful place called Vicky's painted in the neon hues of Barney the big purple dinosaur, warmly greeted us with a polite warning about pickpocketers and the dangers of narcotic drugs hidden in foods from friendly strangers.

We spent most of the day contently exploring the town and enjoying the natural habitat of Barney's dinosaurs friends, who were hiding from view for most of the visit. We got there early enough to see Laksmi, the village elephant, at the Vipalksa temple. Laksmi will bless anyone who gives her two rupees by bopping them in the head with her trunk... unless you are white because her owners have trained her to be racist. (I'm actually not kidding. The elephant knew not to bop any white person in the head unless they handed her ten rupees. Impressive but disturbing talent.) We were overjoyed to discover that our hostel had the luxury of western toilets rather than the squat potties which I recently conquered but still don't really like. Fun fact though, many toilets in India sit on a raised pedestal. This is fine for squat toilets. It's sort of like going to the bathroom on an empty stage (I like to make fake applause noises when I'm finished to make the peeing process more exciting). However, when you place a western toilet on a pedestal you get what I like to call the Awkward High Chair Toilet Effect, in which your legs dangle off the side of the toilet like you are a one year old dining at IHOP.

Saturday: An extremely exciting day, we decided to start our morning early to avoid the unbearable midday heat with a hike to the mountain top Hanuman Temple on the other side of the river. We rose with the sun and got a nice breakfast to fuel our travels, papaya and banana pancakes. Then, I immediately threw up. Realizing the inevitable, I responsibly made my way to our bathroom sink and emptied the contents of my sad western stomach into its dirty porcelain depths, with great pride for my nation that I had made it to the proper puking receptacle, all the while ignoring the faint dripping noise that I assumed was a toilet leak. Then I looked down and discovered that the sink had a pipe that just emptied onto the floor, and I watched my beautifully aimed, sink bound, rainbow of breakfast sludge trickle onto my sneakers. (But if I could just brag for a second, my papaya and banana throw up was the color of a beautiful sunset, so haHA, India. America makes vomitting into art.)

Still early yet, we headed to the river (yet another beautiful place that was obviously part of a fake India set for the weird reality series that Hampi was secretly shooting) to catch the one boat to the other side, about 20 meters away, before the hot part of the day. So that only took about five minutes India time (an hour and a half). Reaching the other side, because we are working on assimilating, we immediately decided to waste a bunch of time enjoying the scenery in the shady parts of town as the giant fiery ball in the sky continued to rise. Beautiful (but definitely not real) rice fields, mountains (probably painted onto the back wall of the biodome in which the Hampi film was taking place), etc. Then we started the 5 km walk to the base of the Hanuman mountain, during the hottest part of the day. Many a rickshaw driver informed us that we would never make it alive unless we took his rickshaw. In India, as you get closer to your destination you also get farther away as we learned from each subsequent rickshaw driver that we passed, who told us that the mountain was further and further (according to my calculations we covered negative 3 km in just under 45 seconds). After walking for a while we decided to take a short cut which proved to be an excellent decision as it led to an excellent adventure of us fording a thorny creek filled with sludge (for all intents and purposed a rapid filled river with quick sand on both sides), battling a spider that was guarding the river (think Shelob from Lord of the Rings), wandering through a banana field labrinth (no sphinx in the middle though), and triumphantly reaching the shade on the other side in the name of glorious America (because I lied before. Now was actually the hottest point in the day) and destroying the Ring of Doom at Mordor. But the ascent to the top of the mountain was yet to come. After our grand adventure, we reached the monkey infested base and prepared for the climb, about 500 India steps (so a million bajillion frillion vermillion steps. Seriously, I do not know what people were thinking when they made steps in this country. At a whooping 5'0" I am of average height here, and the stairs are so steep that I have to do a Super Mario coin jump to move forward. I got tired of shouting "WOOHOO! ITSA ME!" after a while although it seemed to placate the monkeys). Meanwhile, as we puffed up the mountain, Indian construction workers stolled past us toward the top balancing huge bags of cement mix on their heads during the hottest part of the day (because this was actually the hottest part of the day). We made it to the top and the view was, to use the word literally, breathtaking because it actually elicited gasps (even though I know it was just a constructed movie set). The temple was pretty awesome, too. It's supposed to be the birthplace of Hanuman the monkey god from the Ramayana, a major tale/religious epic in Hindu tradition, which coresponds with actual places in India. (Hanuman is awesome. He had to get a magic herb from a mountain to rescue Ramaand he couldn't figure out which one it was, sort of like Donkey in Shrek, so he just picked up the whole mountain. Also, he can fly. And grow and shrink at will.) Anyway, we spent a while up there and then head back down and walked back to town during the hottest part of the day (India is really freaking hot).

Exhausted we stopped for lunch/dinner at the most ridiculous hippy eating establishment I have ever seen. But, America, its getting late so I'm going to leave you with a cliffhanger. Be sure to tune in next time though. There will be tales involving creepy mermaid babies and extremely silly pants.

My Visit to the Sai Baba Ashram on the Magic School Bus

Dear Family, Friends and Creepy Strangers Who Have Been Stumbling Upon My Blog,

Sorry for the sparce proof of my existence in the last few weeks. I've been a little hesitant to write because India is not quite as inherently hilarious as England was, and as I may have mentioned earlier, I hate it when people insist upon assaulting my eardrums with their spiritual life journey / newfound enlightenment / bullhonky profound insights from living somewhere else / how they looked the coyote square in the eyes and saw both fear and respect, etc. So I really don't want to do that to you.

I believe I last left our adventure with my having just safely returned from Ajanta and Ellora, smelling of victory (and uriney public bus), yet still yearning to one day attain a reading list for my classes (call me spoiled, but the syllabus just wasn't enough). I'm happy to report after several more arduous weeks of struggle, I have finally managed to procure the list of books I am maybe supposed to be reading for class. Nevermind that the library doesn't have them; proof of their existence is enough for me. I'm starting to tinker with the idea that perhaps I should stop fabricating these incredibly stressful and apparently unecessary academic quests (i.e. getting my teachers to answer questions, getting my teachers to tell me when their classes take place, getting my teachers to tell me what kind of work I should be doing) since I'm obviously not supposed to do any kind of actual work this semester, but I guess I need something to freak out about. Otherwise these blog posts would be too calm and fulfilled, and who wants adventures without an unecessary, complicated emotional subplot?

At some point during last week (much like Shaggy and Scooby do in most episodes of Scooby Doo as they frantically seek a sandwich of some kind) I accidentally stumbled upon the secret switch that happens to be the key to solving the great India mystery (and getting Mr. Jenkins imprisoned for impersonating a ghost so the old amusement park would have to close down). India is suddenly being nice to me. Rickshaw drivers give me fair prices and unsolicited directions to the bus stop. Shop owners respect my haggling abilities and no longer start at 12 times the actual price. People make small talk with me in Hindi. (Suchita has finally decided to teach verbs in class. She was holding off because she thought I was going to use them for evil. I probably shouldn't have asked her how to say "androcentric.") Only one person tried to cut me in line this week, and I scared him away with my Indian stank face. (I'm not going to press my luck though. This is probably one of those trick Scooby Doo endings in which Fred and Daphne follow some false lead for most of the plot before Velma finally cleans up their mess. I can't stand Fred and Daphne. Anyway, I'm sure the nice-India-lever will switch back soon.)

Most of the last two weeks consisted of more general campus exploring (we have campus monkeys!), NGO visiting (small children think they can trick me into saying Telegu curse words by telling me its their name, but sassiness sounds the same in every language), going out to eat at various super swanky Indian restaurants (I have yet to find an unswanky eating establishment, unless you count the train station two weeks ago), and learning to be a cricket grand master. Yes, America, not only have I learned to play cricket, I got to play a game in the university cricket tournament, and this time, the announcer was even able to tell the other white girls and I apart! Oh, happy day! We won, thanks to our pitcher (a tiny dance major who takes a sprinting start at the pitchers mound, does this graceful little gazelle leap, and then chucks the ball at the batter like the incredible hulk), our two excellent batters, all the other fielders, and my ability to entertain left field with my whimsical American buffoonery. CIEE also took us to this woman's apartment for an Indian cooking lesson, which is awesome, and now when I go home I can make glorious Indian food out of every day items you know like ghee, semolina, and khoya. Oh, you haven't heard of those?

Most recently, I came back from a trip to Puttaparthi to visit the Sathya Sai Baba Ashram with my friend Rachel. We took an overnight bus on Friday and another one back on Saturday, so I am currently running on a weekend of bus sleep (to clarify, bus sleep : regular sleep : : a pizza flavored Hot Pocket : pizza ... with many of the same side effects. For instance, like the grease from a Hot Pocket, I can feel bus germs oozing out my face right now, and I think I might be dying), but it was definitely worth it. The trip went astoundingly well. Everyone gave us great directions. Our bus broke down at around 2AM in a very non English speaking area for about an hour, which could have been catastrophic, but one of the other passengers directed us to another bus, we didn't even have to pay extra, and we go there after sun up instead of having to wait in the unheated ashram bus station at 5AM. The ashram didn't allow pictures, but I did manage to get some pictures from the surrounding town.

Or I was shrunken by Ms. Frizzle's shrink ray at a minigolf course. One of those two. Anyway, the ashram was amazing. We got to attend darsan which was an hour and a half long prayer ritual conducted entirely in song with tabla, sitar, etc. We discovered shawls were mandatory for entering the prayer room. We had made sure to wear high collared long sleeved kurtas so as not to offend anyone, but we had forgotten scarves. So we used the only things we had available, Rachel's pretty Indian sheet with lovely floral pattern that cooincidentally matched perfectly with her outfit and my fleece bright blue polka dot Barney travel blanket. I wish I could have gotten a picture of the inside of the prayer room. There were no walls, so it was an open space with a blue and gold carved ceiling, and ornate glass chandeliers with pigeons living in them intermixed with what appeared to be crape paper pineapples. The little kid sitting next to me kept trying to get me in trouble. She started making funny faces after hour one. Kudos to her for sitting still that long. After that we also got to sit in on a lecture by one of the holymen which was super interesting but I don't want to go on a nerdy tirade right this second. We asked where the best place to eat for lunch was and were immediately directed toward the Western Canteen by the gentleman at the South Indian Canteen who instinctively knew that all white people like plain potatoes, bread, and mayonaise. Upon arriving we discovered that the canteen could not operate unless someone volunteered to work, so we ended up serving rice and potatoes with the other lunch ladies for next hour (which was very fun) before we were rewarded with the first green vegetables I have seen in two months (you cannot possibly fathom how exciting recognizable vegetables are after two moths in India). After eating half my body weight in spinach, my excitement subsided enough for me to realize what it was that had been putting me mildly ill at easy since we had entered the canteen.There were pictures of Sai Baba about every two feet, and all of them were watching me. In fact there was one fairly popular photo of just a cut out of Sai Baba's eyes. I don't mean to make fun of Sai Baba. From what I gather, Sai Baba promotes peace, love, community service, and the end of the caste system. Seems like a pretty good movement. But eye pictures are creepy.


Imagine this picture. But with just eyes.

It didn't help that when we tried to leave the canteen, the women at the door forbodingly shook their heads and directed us toward a brick wall instead. As it turns out, they just wanted us to leave through the secret kitchen exit; we were not in fact trapped in a 1984-esque fantasy world with Alice in Wonderland buildings



You can't tell me that you wouldn't be concerned if you were locked into a room with pictures of eyes everywhere and the archway from Candyland right outside.

 Anyway, it was a really fantastic trip and we made it back to campus by 6:30 this morning, giving me some time to get a shower (I wiped down my arms and legs with Rachel's remaining acne pad in the bus station the night before, but I decided to treat myself). My professor had offered to take me to a local NGO for my research, which was cooincidentally a Sai Baba affiliated organization, so I was super prepared. Except she forgot to mention that they only spoke Telegu. Luckily, the founder's son, who spoke some English, was there.

I think that brings us about up to date, unless you want to count the Jim Gaffigan Youtube videos I've been watching for the last half hour. I'm starting to enjoy India a lot more now that I have met more Indian students and have exciting things to do other than hunt my professors down and flee from rabies. Thanks to all who have continued reading this blog. It's really hit me this semester how long I've been away from home. I don't expect people at home to feel my absence as much as I feel there's because I'm the only thing missing from my home -- life goes on -- but my entire home is missing from me (Life is going on, but is uprooted and restarted every few months). So it does mean a lot that people are still checking in on me after all this time. India continues to be glorious/action-packed/life-changing/full-of-opportunities-for-toilet-humor/etc, but I'll be excited to get home. I'm off to Hampi next weekend to hike and be blessed by an elephant.