To The Other Side of the World

It’s been an overwhelming few days, but I have made it to Pondicherry! We’ve been staying in a hotel in Pondicherry itself (the university is a few miles outside the city) because school doesn’t start until January 21, and we don’t move into the university hostel until January 20. Tomorrow I am going on an overnight train to Cochin with the other members of the IISAC group and our program director Sunny Luke for a 9 day tour of South India. We’ll be visiting spice plantations in Kerala, going on an elephant safari, and learning how to properly wear traditional Indian clothing such as sarees and salvar kameez, After the South Indian tour, we will move to the hostel at Pondicherry University and sit in on different classes for the first two weeks until we decide which five courses to take.

A few days before I was supposed to fly to India, I got a pretty bad cold/viral thing, and so the day of departure rolled around and I had a fever of 101.9 fahrenheit. My concerned parents asked me if I was positive I wanted to leave now, if I should go to India a few days later, etc. and I had a nervous moment – I’m sick before I’ve even left, should I go? Should I stay? – but then realized of course I was going, and headed off to the airport, my backpacks and duffel in tow. The 24 hours of travel that followed were pretty uneventful…I mostly slept on the planes and watched movies, though meeting up with Liz in London was wonderful. We got to Chennai and by the time we had gotten through customs, picked up our luggage, and used the squatting toilets (note:success) it was about 2:15am. We then went on a 2 hour terrifying journey to the hotel in Pondicherry…the drive was the scariest car ride of my life, for sure. I was tired but too excited/scared/sick to fall asleep. Also driving in India is very different than driving in America – drivers constantly honk their horns, there don’t seem to be speed limits, and bikers, autorickshaws, cars, buses, and trucks squeeze past each other really fast, weaving in between cars in ways I did not think were possible.

The next few days were a bit of a blur. We walked around Pondicherry some, exploring both the Tamil side and the calmer French quarter. We tried several South Indian dishes – which are different than the Indian food I’m used to eating in America, which is often North Indian. The most common breakfast foods in South India are things such as idily, which are white rice patties that you dip in a variety of sauces, ghee roast, hollow bread that you dip in different sauces, and purra dosa, fried bread that you – you guessed it – dip in different sauces. Lunch typically consists of thalli, white rice that comes with ten or so sauces. You pour the sauces in the rice and eat everything with your right hand. There is something oddly satisfying about eating with just your right hand, and not using silverware. For dinner we have been eating naan with palak paneer (equivalent of saag paneer in the US), gobi Manchurian (cauliflower dish), or mixed vegetables. Dinner is probably my favorite meal of the day. Also, coffee and tea is always served with cream, and the tea/coffee itself is extra concentrated. You can buy a small cup of chai tea at achaiwalla stand for about 7 rupees (8 or 10 cents). [Note: not everything in India is anywhere near this cheap! For some reason the chai is, though.]

Today was very busy. We got our student visas registered at the Indian consulate in Pondicherry, and then explored the city some. We went to a small aquarium, rode a tiny train in the Pondicherry Botanical Gardens, drank coconut milk from a coconut bought on the street, visited a Catholic church (Very interesting, but the Jew in me did not know where to go or what to do. Anyway.) and a Hindu temple, and went to the beach before having lunch and resting for a bit. The Hindu temple was really cool – I gave a small offering and was blessed by agni (fire). To do this, I brought my hands near a flame and then moved them towards my face, then a man put a red dot on my forehead. Vendors outside of the temple are all hawking their wares, though, and if you show interest at all they will follow you and pressure you into buying things, and once one vendor starts others will follow. Haggling is the norm, though, and I haggled a chain of elephants down from 150 rupees to 50 rupees, or a dollar.

This afternoon we went to Auroville, a completely sustainable community in between Pondicherry University and the city of Pondicherry. It’s very calm and quiet there – it reminded me a lot of the arboretum in Dallas. Auroville attracts a ton of tourists, both Indian and foreign. A huge golden dome is the central point of interest in Auroville, a community that doesn’t believe in religion but rather a single, unifying divinity. Not sure how this concept is actualized, but I intend to find out! After checking out a gift store and sipping some guava juice, I saw a bulletin board with information about volunteering in Auroville. There are ways to get involved with organic farming projects, education and outreach regarding green/sustainability issues, and working with animals. I’m going to settle in a bit to Pondi first before I volunteer, but Auroville is super fascinating, and it’s just a 20 minute bike ride from school so I would love to volunteer there and see how this religion-less divine thing works in real life. 

This is a typical thalli, before rice has been served. You pour the sauces over rice and eat it!

A cow eating from a trash can in the street. First thing I saw when I left the hotel our first day here. Cows are sacred, and people let their cows roam around during the day.

Namaste-ing (see how I made that a verb? Nice one, aye?) at the Pondicherry Botanical Gardens

The motto/basic philosophy behind Auroville

The golden dome at the center of Auroville. Auroville is beautiful!