Old SIP House
Campus
To and from the new House
Monday, December 29, 2008
First trip to the city outskirts
It's 6:45 in the morning and I'm sitting in the commons - this is the first morning I've woken up and felt like I'm in India. There's so much to talk about and it's all been so jumbled that I really have no idea where to begin. I guess I'll turn to chronology for now.
I began the morning by taking pictures of the old SIP house before walking over the the Folk Culture Studies building and beginning . We all received these hand-woven bags which essentially amount to Indian man-bags, filled with materials concerning our next several days of orientation and Hyderabad at large. Chai was served, and we rode over to see the newly constructed SIP house. It's more of a resort than a house and I can't help but feel embarrassed at receiving brand new housing when the money could be used for other purposes (i.e. not pampering American students), especially after seeing the slums behind it, where the builders have lived for the last several months.
I was discussing with some friends the extreme hospitality of Indians, which is both extremely generous and moderately uncomfortable when it seems like we're being treated or regarded as being somehow better or superior. Hyderabad, the city, really seems to capture the tension between traditional and modern, rich and poor, rural and urban which challenges India as a result of globalization.
As we traveled through the city in the afternoon we got our first taste of India outside the University bubble. Never have I seen so much vying for so little space. Temples, shops, slums, apartments, expensive new office buildings and massive billboards all fight for space and your attention, stumbling over each other in a sort of unintelligible jumble which just leaves you confused as to what exactly you're looking at and how it all fits together. So much modernity, from the shops selling western products, to the subway ads, to glass vaults for wealthy businesspeople is prevalent. Yet on the same streets, cows amble through slums as a ragged man squats in the street, smoking.
We left our bus and did a bit of shopping and I was overcome by just how massively different everything was. Indians stared at us as we wandered, doelike, into the shop. Within the store, the uncomfortable sense of being deferred to because of my skin color and implied nationality continued, as women seemed to avoid both my eyes and my path, adjusting themselves to my presence. I can't help but feel like a bit of a sham - there seems to be so much hope in their eyes when they meet mine, for the American Life so many Indians seem to aspire towards. While I hope that globalization has improved the lives of people here, I can't help but feel like I'm peddling defective wares when I smile and say hello; the smiles of the children in the slums demonstrate such a greater happiness than I think the pursuit of wealth could ever accomplish, and I wonder if India's loss of simplicity and Westernization is really all it's cracked up to be.
Going into the city was eye-opening, for certain. For all my hand-wringing, the welcoming smiles of most everyone I saw (well, the men anyways, societal propriety being what it is) really did warm my heart and I felt that incomparable Indian hospitality I've heard so much about. I guess I just hope it doesn't verge on deifying or...just massive resentment if this whole Westernization thing doesn't pan out. But I can certainly appreciate people wanting a better Standard of Living (rife with inherent subjectivity) and the freedom to pursue what they will - and towards that end, I hope they find their happiness. I am just so overcome by my ignorance of Indian life, history and culture to feel remotely qualified to begin identifying problems or solutions within this society or comment on where they're headed as a people and whether that's the Right (see Standarding of Living) way to go.
This is turning out to be a massively humbling experience. A passage I read in the Dao De Jing just before leaving comes to mind:
"Not-knowing is true knowledge.
Presuming to know is a disease.
First realize that you are sick;
then you can move toward health."
Baby steps.
I began the morning by taking pictures of the old SIP house before walking over the the Folk Culture Studies building and beginning . We all received these hand-woven bags which essentially amount to Indian man-bags, filled with materials concerning our next several days of orientation and Hyderabad at large. Chai was served, and we rode over to see the newly constructed SIP house. It's more of a resort than a house and I can't help but feel embarrassed at receiving brand new housing when the money could be used for other purposes (i.e. not pampering American students), especially after seeing the slums behind it, where the builders have lived for the last several months.
I was discussing with some friends the extreme hospitality of Indians, which is both extremely generous and moderately uncomfortable when it seems like we're being treated or regarded as being somehow better or superior. Hyderabad, the city, really seems to capture the tension between traditional and modern, rich and poor, rural and urban which challenges India as a result of globalization.
As we traveled through the city in the afternoon we got our first taste of India outside the University bubble. Never have I seen so much vying for so little space. Temples, shops, slums, apartments, expensive new office buildings and massive billboards all fight for space and your attention, stumbling over each other in a sort of unintelligible jumble which just leaves you confused as to what exactly you're looking at and how it all fits together. So much modernity, from the shops selling western products, to the subway ads, to glass vaults for wealthy businesspeople is prevalent. Yet on the same streets, cows amble through slums as a ragged man squats in the street, smoking.
We left our bus and did a bit of shopping and I was overcome by just how massively different everything was. Indians stared at us as we wandered, doelike, into the shop. Within the store, the uncomfortable sense of being deferred to because of my skin color and implied nationality continued, as women seemed to avoid both my eyes and my path, adjusting themselves to my presence. I can't help but feel like a bit of a sham - there seems to be so much hope in their eyes when they meet mine, for the American Life so many Indians seem to aspire towards. While I hope that globalization has improved the lives of people here, I can't help but feel like I'm peddling defective wares when I smile and say hello; the smiles of the children in the slums demonstrate such a greater happiness than I think the pursuit of wealth could ever accomplish, and I wonder if India's loss of simplicity and Westernization is really all it's cracked up to be.
Going into the city was eye-opening, for certain. For all my hand-wringing, the welcoming smiles of most everyone I saw (well, the men anyways, societal propriety being what it is) really did warm my heart and I felt that incomparable Indian hospitality I've heard so much about. I guess I just hope it doesn't verge on deifying or...just massive resentment if this whole Westernization thing doesn't pan out. But I can certainly appreciate people wanting a better Standard of Living (rife with inherent subjectivity) and the freedom to pursue what they will - and towards that end, I hope they find their happiness. I am just so overcome by my ignorance of Indian life, history and culture to feel remotely qualified to begin identifying problems or solutions within this society or comment on where they're headed as a people and whether that's the Right (see Standarding of Living) way to go.
This is turning out to be a massively humbling experience. A passage I read in the Dao De Jing just before leaving comes to mind:
"Not-knowing is true knowledge.
Presuming to know is a disease.
First realize that you are sick;
then you can move toward health."
Baby steps.
Sunday, December 28, 2008
First Impressions
I'm currently sitting in the old SIP (Study in India Program) House lobby with the other students, waiting to go on a walking tour of the campus. I keep phasing between total alertness and heavy drowsiness (currently experiencing the latter) due to the 11.5 hour time difference.
Getting here went well, and didn't feel as long as it sounded. I dozed a bit on each flight and enjoyed meals as they came, without much regard for which meals corresponded to which parts of the day. The whole thing felt like one oddly stretched out day, broken up by reading, sleeping and eating.
Heathrow was posh, filled with trendy bars and restaurants serving expensive drinks and meals. That said, the British accent never fails to bring a smile to my face, especially when conveying meaning through unfamiliar phrases ("you're welcome" = "that's alright"; "trash" = "rubbish", etc). I didn't have much time to wander around the airport, but nabbed some pictures as I rushed through security to my security gate.
The next flight was more of the same, though it was sadly dark outside as we approached Hyderabad, so I wasn't able to see the landscape below. I quickly realized I had become the local minority, exiting the plane and waiting in line to pass through customs. I shortly bumped into the other CIEE students and we worked our way through the airport, emerging to crowds of Indians who vied for our collective cab fare in the pre-dawn darkness. The weather immediately reminded me of Hawaii in the morning. Spotting the CIEE-sign-holding fellow, we were herded out of the airport over to a large white bus (sadly not the ornate, purple one), which we then rode for an hour through the city, to the University.
As we drove along, we saw all sorts of little shops, strewn across an arid backdrop, from which a series of cement and wire-framed structures errupted. The smashing of rural and urban struck me as most peculiar, as the two areas, generally mutually exclusive in America, meshed together. Slums were strewn along decaying adboards and partially built, some seemingly abandonned, buildings. Among other unusual sights were herds of goats and sheep, wandering stray dogs and multi-colored everything - buses, rickshaws and buildings to name a few.
We arrived at the University and moved into our temporary rooms, at the old SIP guest house (we'll be moving into the new one today or tomorrow) before having some breakfast (Indian pancakes for the win). The temperature steadily increased as we drove to the University and had reached Hawaii's mid-day by around 9:30. After breakfast, I went exploring with some other students - the campus buildings are beautiful, in a state of semi-decay which seems to be characteristic of much of pre-modernized India. I am hopelessly in love with the open-air design of the buildings (again, highly reminiscent of Hawaii) which appear to have been built around nature itself, so that the interior of most buildings is rife with flowers and unique trees.
Lunch was also delicious (I'll upload some food pictures soon) and I went exploring again afterwards, this time in the opposite direction of campus, which led to the discovery of cactus trees, tall, upwardly-pluming peacock-like trees and a surprise lake.
--Writing from the next morning--
The tour yesterday afternoon went well, as we saw some areas of campus I hadn't found on my intial wanderings, specifically the yoga center, gym, bus stop and local shopping area. They pointed us in the direction of the new SIP Guest House, which is about 2km (1.6mi, I think) north of main campus. For that reason, we'll be getting bikes soon, which should make it easier to get around the sprawling campus. In the evening, the heat (it got very warm from around 11-2) eased and the evening temperatures again resembled Hawaii's at that time.
I felt an overwhelming calm, walking around campus last evening, as the birds chirped and dogs wandered around us. I wonder how this campus was conceived and built; the area seems so undisturbed and the buildings so casually strewn about, that it almost seems as though they selected already cleared out areas as building sites. The buildings are so often obscured by the surrounding forrestry, that one often has the sense of being in an area unaffected by man or woman. Beyond scenic, it is truly serene.
New photos
Getting here went well, and didn't feel as long as it sounded. I dozed a bit on each flight and enjoyed meals as they came, without much regard for which meals corresponded to which parts of the day. The whole thing felt like one oddly stretched out day, broken up by reading, sleeping and eating.
Heathrow was posh, filled with trendy bars and restaurants serving expensive drinks and meals. That said, the British accent never fails to bring a smile to my face, especially when conveying meaning through unfamiliar phrases ("you're welcome" = "that's alright"; "trash" = "rubbish", etc). I didn't have much time to wander around the airport, but nabbed some pictures as I rushed through security to my security gate.
The next flight was more of the same, though it was sadly dark outside as we approached Hyderabad, so I wasn't able to see the landscape below. I quickly realized I had become the local minority, exiting the plane and waiting in line to pass through customs. I shortly bumped into the other CIEE students and we worked our way through the airport, emerging to crowds of Indians who vied for our collective cab fare in the pre-dawn darkness. The weather immediately reminded me of Hawaii in the morning. Spotting the CIEE-sign-holding fellow, we were herded out of the airport over to a large white bus (sadly not the ornate, purple one), which we then rode for an hour through the city, to the University.
As we drove along, we saw all sorts of little shops, strewn across an arid backdrop, from which a series of cement and wire-framed structures errupted. The smashing of rural and urban struck me as most peculiar, as the two areas, generally mutually exclusive in America, meshed together. Slums were strewn along decaying adboards and partially built, some seemingly abandonned, buildings. Among other unusual sights were herds of goats and sheep, wandering stray dogs and multi-colored everything - buses, rickshaws and buildings to name a few.
We arrived at the University and moved into our temporary rooms, at the old SIP guest house (we'll be moving into the new one today or tomorrow) before having some breakfast (Indian pancakes for the win). The temperature steadily increased as we drove to the University and had reached Hawaii's mid-day by around 9:30. After breakfast, I went exploring with some other students - the campus buildings are beautiful, in a state of semi-decay which seems to be characteristic of much of pre-modernized India. I am hopelessly in love with the open-air design of the buildings (again, highly reminiscent of Hawaii) which appear to have been built around nature itself, so that the interior of most buildings is rife with flowers and unique trees.
Lunch was also delicious (I'll upload some food pictures soon) and I went exploring again afterwards, this time in the opposite direction of campus, which led to the discovery of cactus trees, tall, upwardly-pluming peacock-like trees and a surprise lake.
--Writing from the next morning--
The tour yesterday afternoon went well, as we saw some areas of campus I hadn't found on my intial wanderings, specifically the yoga center, gym, bus stop and local shopping area. They pointed us in the direction of the new SIP Guest House, which is about 2km (1.6mi, I think) north of main campus. For that reason, we'll be getting bikes soon, which should make it easier to get around the sprawling campus. In the evening, the heat (it got very warm from around 11-2) eased and the evening temperatures again resembled Hawaii's at that time.
I felt an overwhelming calm, walking around campus last evening, as the birds chirped and dogs wandered around us. I wonder how this campus was conceived and built; the area seems so undisturbed and the buildings so casually strewn about, that it almost seems as though they selected already cleared out areas as building sites. The buildings are so often obscured by the surrounding forrestry, that one often has the sense of being in an area unaffected by man or woman. Beyond scenic, it is truly serene.
New photos
Thursday, December 25, 2008
Restless and ready
I'm all packed up, ready to drive down to Chicago and leave for Hyderabad, India tomorrow. I'll update once I have something to say and have recovered sufficiently from jet lag to say it coherently.
Also, I'll be uploading photos semi-regularly to http://picasaweb.google.com/craigw648
Strange - the next time I'll be writing here, it will be from the other side of the planet.
Also, I'll be uploading photos semi-regularly to http://picasaweb.google.com/craigw648
Strange - the next time I'll be writing here, it will be from the other side of the planet.
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