Get back on track

I've been hard at work. My recent culture shock/bad attitude is beginning to resolve itself. After several conversations with friends, both Indian and American, here and at home via thew internet, it seems that I am just generally worn out on being in Hyderabad.

Honestly, Hyderabad is not a bad place. My friends here are some of the most wonderful, faith-filled, non-judgemental people I have ever met. It has worn me down though to be in a constant state of "What the hell is going on?" It is a state I find myself in often, standing around, skimming scraps of conversation from my classmates. It is a dream state almost. It feels like I should know what is going on, but I just can't quite understand.

Yesterday, I went out into the open area surrounding the campus for a long bike ride. I followed a road, which turned into a pair of tracks, which turned to a winding cow trail. It was very quiet, and I actually managed to escape into a landscape that had no litter (that is very difficult here). I sat, looking at the small lake and wondered what to do about my deteriorating attitude. I don't really have the resources to be traveling all over India, seeing temples and what not. It has gotten to me a bit, and I was wishing I had joined a trip to Nepal which two friends went on.

With my attitude question still unresolved, I moved on, passing the brush and the rocks and finally coming to where the cow trails again turned into a pair of tracks, and then a road, and then a divided road under contruction. I found myself in a huge soon-to-be-suburb. All of the buildings were in the same state of bare construction-concrete pillars reaching up being lead by bare reinforcement-bar skeltons towards the sky. Here and there were late workers. I wondered who would be coming here to this very modern, squarely laid out village. Surrounding these skeletons were the many village huts of the workers who were building the empty structures.

I'm not really sure what I was hoping to find out on that ride. Pretty views maybe. A pepsi. Space. Piece of mind.

Waking up in India

I often wonder why exactly I and everyone else here from a "Developed" nation has to go through this process of giving up on that idea of "what's wrong with those poor people's society," and how it should be changed. I took two months, but I am quite clear now on the level of my understanding of life here (better than zero, but not much). Even the smallest of things have different meanings here. Take for example two tiny words, that sort of mean the same thing, but don't really. The english word "sir" and the Hindi word "ji."

"ji" sounds like "g," or as I most often like to think "G." It's a suffix really, and it gives a meaning of respectful address. You attach it to the end of a name or mother, or father, or to the end of a positive or negative answer. So it gets translated at "sir" mostly. Unfortunately, "sir" doesn't really mean much for me, as I throw "sir" about with complete abandon at home, and often sarcastically. I also do the same with "G" with friends. In fact I think "G" probably is more respectful when I use it than "sir" as it carries a bit more closeness.

Here though, my tendency to use "sir" to address people has actually given me a lot of help. It's a magic word. Here, "sir" is "ji" and immediately makes you a very polite gentleman (unless you use it on a friend who wants you to treat them as an equal or familiar). Teachers certainly bother me less, and officials leave me instantly out of the ugly American category the moment "ji" or "sir" escapes my lips.

In the end, while I recognize that this is a bit strange and ridiculous to me, on the other hand, a respectful society is certainly a nice idea. People are generally friendly here. I get a lot of privilege because of my age, skin color and gender combined. It's ridiculous, but I am not about to knock it.

The women on this trip have a tough time getting around, and saying it sucks is a bit of a callous understatement. It more than sucks. However, it doesn't suck because of something inherently wrong with this society. It sucks mostly because it makes it nearly impossible for young women to assimilate safely into this society at large. Where my skin color makes me a target of useful attention (to a point) theirs certainly does not. Add to that the general notion of Western women as immoral. All of the things you're supposed to be able to do in the States are gone. I say "supposed to be able" because it's not a sure thing at home either, and it's easy to forget that here. I haven't run into a foreign idea about women here. It's the same old crap at home that ignorance creates. This is the root of the problem here for visitors. For the most part, women and men are completely foreign to each other, because that is the way the culture works here. It's got its problems, but so does our culture (if you can call it that... I'll get to that another time), and we only have a third of the people to deal with.

For a while, it seems like a good idea to categorize and judge this or that about this culture. I think though that it is unwise. Especially if you are at a disadvantage here. Continuing to keep placing the people you meet into the category of "other" is going to keep them as enemies really. At least, these are the things I tell myself. Respect is key to survival.