Things I will miss

• Once I figured out the bus situation, I got really comfortable getting around on my own. Getting from BCollege (Shibpur) to almost anywhere in Calcutta with a combination of bus, metro and taxi was pretty cool. There's different colored buses that take different routes, and depending where I want to go, there's a strategic route I should take that's the most direct and perhaps closest to a metro station. So once I got my hands on a map (which was a challenge in itself) and knew the general location of specific neighborhoods, the next challenge was to decipher what the hell the bus guy was yelling at the stop. If the bus is going Howrah Station, he yells "howrahowrahowrah" in a loud monotonous robotic voice. If I've never heard/seen the bus stop name before, it just sounded like a random mix of sounds that had no meaning. Some of the buses had writing on them indicating the route, mostly in Bengali and few in English.
• I'll miss crossing the Hooghly while sitting in a window seat on the rattling buses. I'll miss the cool bridges.
• I'll miss the small victories I celebrated each time I made it to a new destination w/o getting lost. A compass would have helped tremendously but my internal compass and amazing (if I say so myself) sense of direction gave me the confidence and security to get around on my own, even when the buses did not stick to a route I knew. I knew I would figure it out before the end of my trip, the hard part was just getting the initial information so that I could make a mental map.
• No commitments, no appointments, no pressure to hang out with friends, family, boyfriend, pretty much no social calendar. Although it was scary and lonely at times, it was nice to have very few commitments.
• Working very few hours a day. 5 minute walking commute to lab. 2 hour lunch break.
• Chai
• The hospitality shown by Mallika Maasi and Nandita Auntie, they treated me like family even though I had never met them.
• The joy of hearing someone speaking English, especially with an American accent.
• Reading. I'm pretty sure I'm going to give up this crazy reading habit once I'm back in front of my tv. I'm not ashamed to admit it. In fact, this reading was starting to hurt my eyesight.

Conclusions

So as my time in Calcutta is coming to an end, I figured I'd jot down some concluding thoughts about my time here. There will be some things I miss, and for that I'll write a separate post.

When I decided to take this position (which fell into my lap pretty much, I def could not say no), I was excited and open to exploring a new city/place/university. I came in with no expectations, just open to adventure. I was a bit optimistic and romantic in my ideas about the situation, but I tried really hard not to have any expectations about my time in Calcutta. I knew I was going to a small university, but I didn't know how small the town actually is.

I didn't sign up for an introspective, spiritual, living in the boonies retreat, but at times it felt like it was being forced on me. Communicating frustrations in Hindi is difficult with my Kindergarten language level. I can express being happy or content and simple phrases, but trying to say something like, "I've told you x many times, this food is too spicy. I've lost weight and have been getting stomach problems b/c of this food" or "There shouldn't be rats in the AFM room, they will eat through the wires and can damage equipment. What's the point of me taking off my shoes before entering the lab if there's going to be rat feces on the floor?" is very challenging and emotionally draining.

That's how I would summarize it actually, emotionally draining. I've learned what drains me emotionally, and that's a good lesson I guess. I've learned that I realllllly want a gym, dance and my own kitchen to keep me healthy and happy on a daily basis. (I would say NEED, but that might be an exaggeration.) Luckily, the work I was doing here did not need me to bring my A-game, meaning my lethargy, sleeping habits, lack of motivation, emotional drainage and un-optimum health did not one bit alter the quality of the work I was doing (which is meant to say more about the work than about me). Although I had no serious illness to deal with, my loss of muscle and general weakness will take some time to heal, but hopefully it was just the heat my body was reacting too.

I am not ashamed to admit, I made 0 friends on my own. Sure, I tried, but I found it hard to find people my age with my interests that made an effort to show me around. I resorted to finding tourists to chat with when I was in Calcutta, but most of them were only here for a few days. I'm actually not really a people person, I am not the one to instigate a conversation but I was so desperate that I actually did a few times, coming up with lame reasons that hopefully did not come off as too desperate. Even social interactions are so culturally different here, it's hard for me to know exactly what is appropriate/normal and what isn't (but that could be a whole other posting). Part of me thinks even if I did make friends I would just get annoyed after hanging out 1 or 2 times.

The thing that saved me was being able to get out into Calcutta on the weekends. Once I figured out the bus and metro routes, I could get around on my own and explore. I actually loved riding the bus and metro and will definitely miss public transportation.

I am so over roti-sabji-daal-bhat. Definitely miss chaat food since I can't eat that here.

When can I start counting down hours? The next challenge is getting through the flight. ugh.

temple visits

This past weekend I visited Dakshineshwar Temple and Belur Math, both along the Hooghly on opposite sides.

Dakshineshwar Kali Temple is along the eastern bank of the Hooghly river (and the locals call it Ganga even though it branches off from the Ganga a long ways away) and its a temple to Bhavartini Kali built in 1855. There's the usual temple madness, long lines to get in, pushing and shoving to make it to the altar with your offering, tons of flower and puja supply stalls. However, the lines here did seem to have some sort of order, although having security guards at the entrance and exit directing people like cattle outside of a temple is a funny/weird sight. I always get irritated by this whole process, this time I just walked around and absorbed everything, mostly people watched and snapped some pix. The architecture is very cool and its a pretty big complex with 12 smaller Shiva temples surrounding it (Shiva was Kali's companion). I'd much rather enjoy an older temple, maybe that has some archaeological/historical significance, with no crowds. Although I do appreciate the mythology surrounding the gods and goddesses (can someone start making hollywood movies about this?). Why is Kali standing on Shiva?

Belur Math is along the western bank of the river and is the headquarters for the Ramakrishna Math and Mission (Vendanta Movement). The Math is the monastic org for those who follow Sri Ramakrishna, and the mission is more of the social service branch and was founded by Swami Vivekananda. The campus is pretty awesome, with some very cool buildings, very peaceful and calm, none of the craziness of Dakshineshwar. The view of the river was also awesome. It was interesting and I would have liked to wonder around more but it was friggin HOT. I wrote an essay in high school about the Transcendental Movement in the US (how vedantic philosophy was brought over to the US) and Swami Vivekananda had a lot to do with it, so it was cool to see the place for those reasons.

Shantaram by Gregory David Roberts

I finally read Shantaram, I heard lots of great things about it and found it in the first book shop I went to looking for it. It's a bit intimidating for someone like me, its 933 pages with relatively small font. Once I started it, I devoured it. It's based on a true story, in the 1980's the author escaped from a prison in Australia and moved to Bombay. The book is about his time there, the people he met, adventures he had and details of the Bombay underworld. I'm not sure which details are true, but the suspense and story telling is soo good. He talks about visiting the Maharashtran country side where he picks up Marathi, gives great descriptions of everything from the way people "wiggle" their heads to the details about someone's face or personality. The writing is very poetic and it would be a great novel to have to read in an English class. He talks a lot of love, pain, philosophy, fear, suffering, faith, trust, pretty much any human emotion or trait. There's plenty of humor as well. I'm going to have to read it again and mark the passages I really enjoyed.

Here's a good one:

"Whatever the reason, I felt dishearteningly alone in the city. I'd lost Prabakar and Abdullah, my closest friends, in the same week, and with them I'd lost the mark on the psychic map that says You are here. Personality and personal identity are in some ways like co-ordinates on the street map drawn by our intersecting relationships. We know who we are and we define what we are by references to the people we love and our reasons for loving them."

"He hadn't said anything to me about Parvati, one of Kumar's two pretty daughters, but I'd seen him talking to her, and I guessed that he was falling in love. In Prabaker's way of courtship, a young man didn't bring flowers or chocolates to the woman he loved: he brought her stories from the wider world, where men grappled with demons of desire, and monstrous injustice. He brought her gossip and scandals and intimate secrets. He brought her the truth of his brave heart, and the mischievous, awe struck wonder that was the wellspring of his laughter, and of that sky-wide smile. And as I watched him scurry toward the chai shop, I saw that already his head was wagging and his hands were waving as he rehearsed the story that he brought to her as the new day's gift."

Shopping

I'm not usually a big shopper; as much as I love new, unique things, I also try to rebel against the consumerism so prevalent today. But given the fact that I'm being paid in rupees and have a local atm/debit card, its mighty difficult to resist. But then I also have to think of my baggage, the excess weight fees are definitely not worth it, especially since its a weight range, not a charge per kg that you are over the weight limit.

In general, its hard to find truly unique, affordable clothing. So I try to reinvent clothes that I already have. Before I buy something, I try to judge a piece of clothing or accessory by asking myself "Does this piece deserve space in my closet?" I try to think of my closet as prime real estate, it will help prevent me from spending too much money or just buying cheap junk that I don't necessarily need and that is just unoriginal and a waste of space. I would love to do a clothing swap actually and I love the concept of used clothing stores.

Note: I need to make an album of the various ways I can think of to wear a sari, in non traditional ways. But its hard to do on myself, so I need a model.

Shopping in Kolkata has been fun, I've bought some fabrics (which I hope to use on my sewing machine), some handicrafts (not too many though), some western cut dresses from Pantaloons (department store), batik sarong type materials from Shantiniketan; but no jewelry. I'm done shopping for now and will try to pack the bags and see how much they weigh before I even think about shopping more. Hopefully the things I bought weigh the same as the consumables I brought with me and things I will leave behind here.

The two malls I went to are City Centre and South City. City Centre is a bit like the Spectrum or fashion island except multi storied, outdoor type but with some indoor AC areas too, and movie theatre (where I saw "alice in wonderland"). South City is a huge 5 story indoor AC mall with a Target type store in the basement, movie theatre (where I saw "clash of the titans", only b/c I was bored), two department stores (Shopper's Stop and Pantaloon's). The two days I went there a cricket game was playing on the big screen in the center atrium and people were gathered around and cheering. The food court was pretty cool although for some of the eateries you had to buy a pre paid card to buy food. I had Subway! I spent about 1 hour in pantaloon's, the first store I went into in South City, and bought 4 things, and didn't buy anything else that day or the next day when I returned. I was pretty happy with myself for resisting the urge!

My eyes are consistently drawn to the Indian prints and patterns, paisleys, florals, batik . . and the good thing is that its so overwhelming that I can't pick just one or two things, so then I just walk out of the store. whew. crisis averted.

My one splurge, besides the spa visits, is a truly unique, designer dress that I'm really excited about and can't wait to wear. It's getting altered to fit me right now. I found a local designer online that has her own clothing line, some very cool fusion type wear. Some of the patterns were a bit overwhelming for me (pink leopard print or just mis-matched patterns) but I got a beige dress that has sari type draping and is long and flowy. She also came out with a vcd about different ways to wear saris, so i bought one. It's got some cool ideas, but most of the ideas just include more ways to make the sari even more bulky and cover up more of your body.

I also bought some books, which def. might add up on the scale. I think those would be the first I would sacrifice if it was necessary.

Temper Tantrum

Just came very close to punching a hole in a wall or actually breaking my hand instead. Getting non-spicy food is a constant battle here at the guest house dining hall. I thought the message was clear, apparently not all the staff knows. So do I have to speak to each guy in the staff and tell them individually I don't eat spicy food? Does the cook even know? I spoke to someone who I assume is the manager (Ashish), and assumed he would tell everyone. This was in late February. Then he left for vacation in March so I had to tell someone else (Asim) who I assumed had some authority. I've told him atleast 5 or 6 times in the past few weeks. Today, I find out Ashish is back while Asim is gone for vacation, so I have to tell this guy again. Do they not understand my Hindi? I was holding back tears, but I should have just cried in front of them, maybe they'd get the point then. I think I'll get someone who I know understands me to write a note in Bengali and give that to the manager. This is ridiculous.

I think I'm a pretty patient person, and I try to be nice to the people that serve me, I say thank you and please and smile, even if that's not normal or reciprocated most of the time in India. If they need a reminder for something, I hold back my frustration and ask again nicely. But I can only do that so much, especially when I am starving and don't want to deal with stomach aches (and other stuff that is TMI) the next morning. I try not to bother other people with my problems, like the Materials Science Staff (that is actually another frustration) b/c if I can communicate then I should just take care of it myself, right? ugh.