March 30th - Namma Bhoomi

Two blog posts in one week, I must be procrastinating on something....

No, but I really just wanted to tell you all about one of the field visits I went on last weekend since it was probably one of my favorites so far! About an hour and a half away from Manipal University is a campus called Namma Bhoomi. It’s essentially a residential school for children in grade school who community workers recognize as needing an extra hand. The point of the school is not just to assist them with their normal grade school education but to also equip them with life skills and vocational training. They make the most beautiful clothes, rugs, handbags, wallets and other crafts and sell them through the sister organization called Namma Angadi. They can also choose to learn carpentry, computer technology or even cosmetology as a way to support themselves and help their family after graduation. Most of these children would have been working in harsher conditions and schooling might not have been a priority had it not been for Namma Bhoomi.

The larger non-profit organization that owns the Namma Bhoomi campus is The Concerned for the Working Child. The CWC has been working for over 30 years I believe on advocating for children's labor rights and is using some really cool methods to try and increase the voice of children in the community. For instance, one of the teachers we met with at Namma Bhoomi told us about the local Makkala panchayats where children are formed into a kind of mock-democracy and are encouraged to discuss real and prevalent issues that are also being discussed in higher levels of government. The benefits of empowering the children in this way are too many to list here but use your imagination!

One of the best parts about Namma Bhoomi that, to be frank, I wasn't expecting was the eco-friendly aspect. Not only was it one of the best run and truly effective non-profits I've seen but it also took the concept of sustainability very seriously on their campus. The kitchen ran on bio-gas from the dung of the farm animals that made the milk and eggs. The once barren land now is shaded by thousands of trees and is covered in beautiful, pesticide and fertilizer free gardens (which the kids keep up themselves). Even the homes are made by the carpenters using low cost materials.

Oh and did I mention that they are trying to minimize the effects of gender bias and caste discrimination too? No wonder they're up for a Nobel Peace Prize!!! Hopefully I'll be able to work with them again in the future because it really was an awesome place (plus the food was by far the freshest meal I've had in India)!

If you want to learn more here is the link to their website, and I put my name on the mailing list so if any new information comes up I'll post it so you can all see it too. http://workingchild.org/

Pictures -Holi

What? Is there something on my face?

5 minutes later in class for a test...our teacher didn't like us much that day, oops

Happy Holi !

It’s been far too long since I last posted and I apologize, my excuse is that I’m busy having the time of my life :) I realized that I never posted about Holi! It was one of the top things I was looking forward to coming to India during this time. I got a little nervous when I heard that the festival wasn’t really celebrated down south as much (where I am) and then even more nervous when I heard that we had a field visit and a test scheduled on that day. Luckily we found a way to celebrate on campus with a bunch of the public health students that we have class with. We met up with them after they had already started but all day people were flinging pure pigment and died water all over the KMC greens (like a quad or courtyard-type thing) making us look like a bunch of multicolored avatars.

            So for those who don’t know, Holi is a Hindu festival celebrated every March, mostly in Northern India. This year it fell on March 8th and I’ve heard that it has become a big tourist attraction in northern towns and the festivals last all day non-stop.  It is also called the festival of colors and through the pictures you can see why! Originally and historically, Holi marks the end of "winter"  and the beginnig of spring. It is supposed to commemorate the good harvest, the beautiful spring colors and many different religious myths and legends. For us and many of the students with us, the major premise was to throw pure color and pigment at eachother until you are covered and literally spitting greens and purples. They also like to get you with a few buckets of water and dye so we made sure to not wear any clothes that we were particularly fond of. One of our friends who has blond hair normally, still has a full head of pink hair from the dye, and the paint took a good two weeks to fully leave my finger and toenails! But it was totally worth it and I even bought a set of colors to bring back to the US this past weekend! I’m really glad that Manipal has such a diverse group of student and that this festival was brought here with them so that I got to experience it!

            Oh and by the way it is now March 28^th and the Holi color is still on the streets and sidewalks. It’s proof that we haven’t seen a single drop of precipitation since we’ve been here!

Pictures of Travel Week! (very belated sorry :/)

 Henna Stamps = the one thing I regret NOT buying!!

 Home sweet home for the night on the train!

 One of my favorite parts of the trip! Bike riding through Hampi :)

Sari shopping in Mysore with Ginny

6am Safari, we were sick of eating bugs 

Making pots in Ooty 

My masterpiece 

Panoramic View of Hampi (I made this myself isn't it cool!)

february 24th -March 4th Travel Week!!

We arrived first by airplane in Bangalore, the third largest city in India and Karnataka’s state capital. It once had a reputation for being the Florida of the Northeast; meaning that it’s where everyone wants to be once they retire but recent changes gave me mixed signals as to the current pride the locals take in their city. The weather is beautiful and of course there’s a lot of perks to living in a city including awesome culture, business, shopping and food which we took advantage of while we were there. We stayed at the Bangalore Club which reflecting back was one of my favorites from travel week. After arriving late at night on Friday, we all passed out on the extremely comfy beds pretty quickly. For the next two days we explored, hitting up an Infosys campus (the Microsoft of India), Karnataka’s state assembly building, Lalbagh gardens, Iskcon (international society for Krishna consciousness), a local BJP politician named Chandre Gowda, and then of course the band and dance floor back at the club.

 Late Sunday night, after a wonderful dinner overlooking all of Bangalore, we caught an overnight train to Hampi, the land of ruins and temples galore. The highlight here for me was definitely exploring the untraveled path with Preston and Grantis on our rented bicycles. Although it was probably the hottest day of the whole trip (and the origin of my first Indian sunburn) I really enjoyed getting to be actively enjoying the vastness of the old Vijayanagara Empire we were exploring. The ruins were really cool and allowed you to really use your imagination and picture what it would be like when the elephant stables were full and the Kings palace consisted of more than just the stone walls and an Olympic size swimming pool. Being a UNESCO world heritage site, there were a significant amount of tourists there in Hampi, which in all cases causes its pros and cons. One rickshaw driver we had on the way back from dinner one night (who spoke 7 or 8 languages btw) referenced how the Karnataka state government recently shut down and destroyed over 70% of the shops around Hampi in an effort to clean up the town. While a clean-up was probably necessary, displacing all of those workers and their families will only do more harm than good in the long run.

Another overnight train ride and some masala dosas later, we checked in at the Paradise Hotel (I don’t know if I’d go that far but it was still very nice). This was one of the slower paced days with a visit to King Tipu’s summer palace and some browsing through all of the sandlewood products that Mysore is known for. We even indulged in some eye candy and picked through countless silk saris.

Kabini was next. My memories of its hammocks and sunshine are making me homesick for a place I stayed for only one night. Right outside the Rajivghandi National Park, Kabini is the place to go for a Safari. We actually went on two, one came with a 5:45 wake up call, and the other was just in the afternoon. Unfortunately we didn’t get to see a tiger or leopard but we did see lots of wild elephants, goar, spotted dear, monkeys, peacocks and other pretty birds.

8 hours after we left Kabini, we arrived in the hill station of Ooty in the state of Tamil Nadu. Ooty had my favorite hotel we stayed in by far. Since the nights got chilly up in the hills, a fire was lit in your room at night and the whole place had a cozy atmosphere that made you just want to snuggle up with a good book. During the day I got to put my one semester of ceramics 101 to good use when one of the tribal women we were visiting offered for me to try and make one after she just whipped one out in literally two minutes flat. I didn’t do half bad I don’t think but that didn’t stop the locals from laughing at me hysterically the whole time (the language barrier made it difficult to know whether it was at me or with me). Another highlight was getting to go to an NGO that worked with tribal women, teaching them how to sew the traditional patterns onto a variety of visitor-friendly items including place mats and shoulder bags.

The last exciting thing that happened on travel week could have ended badly but fortunately now its just a cool story. So, about 30 minutes before we reach the train station for our final train home, I notice our program directors getting a little worried. We pull over at a checkpoint where our driver was supposed to document our travel over a state border but instead we see him get back on the bus and quickly start maneuvering the bus out of the crowded checkpoint in a obviously illegal manner and start hightailing down the highway so that we wouldn’t miss our train (apparently he was sick of us by then). So 30 minutes go by and we pull up to the station 5 minutes late with our backpacks on ready to sprint, one of the girls has a hurt leg though so we couldn’t go that fast. And luckily we see the train still there…but our cabin isn’t until the very end. So we start booking down the terminal trying to get close to our cabin when the train starts to move. I look behind me and the others were bottlenecking into one door so I go to the one up ahead thinking it would be quicker, only to find it locked. So starting to panic a teensy bit, I sprint to the next one where a good Samaritan helps me hop on a moving train that had gained sufficient speed before I was left by myself in an Indian train station with a dead cell phone and the worst sense of direction God ever gave a human being.

Anyways that’s all. If you read all of it I really appreciate it but if you didn’t I completely understand. Today was Holi, I’ll probably post some pics of that soon as well as pics from the trip! But now its dinna time so ill get to that later. J

Pictures February 21st

 My new Indian Family. No but seriously, I don't know them, they just wanted to take my picture.

 View of the very large temple in Murudeshwar

 On the beach in Gokarna

Immunizing the children

Ceremonial stuffing of the birthday girls' face.

February 21st

Another week has flown by. I honestly cannot believe how fast the time is passing here. I can feel myself starting to think and act more like I belong too. When I get into a rickshaw I tell them how much I will pay instead of asking, I now pick and choose which breakfasts to get in the mess hall depending on the day (Tomorrow is banana buns! My personal fave), and most notably, every time I see another white person on campus I automatically ask myself ‘what are they doing here?’ and I find myself staring for no reason at all. I quickly realize that I am doing exactly what I wished others would stop doing to me but I’m realizing it’s very hard not to be a little bit curious

                Classes last week were pretty time consuming. Between my 5 classes here, one online course for Arcadia, our Hindi lessons, our Bharatnatym dance class, and our 6:30 am yoga, our days are always full and the homework piles up quickly. Other than a typical student complaint about homework, I can’t say a bad thing about anything pertaining to the program so far. Well, there are a total of 9 mosquito bites on my right arm alone but I take my malaria meds daily so they should be fine… right?? :/

                Yesterday (Sunday), was a national polio eradication day here in India. We got to visit a lot of the vaccination sites that were set up all over each town. The program is primarily sponsored by WHO (world health organization) and the Gates foundation (as in Bill Gates of Microsoft). It has proven to be really effective and last year was the first year since it began that there were absolutely no new cases of polio recorded in India! woohoo :) It was nice to hear that it really was making a difference since it’s a fact that most projects and public health missions in India only receive $.15 out of every dollar given. There is a lot of corruption and bribing that goes on behind the scenes in India so a lot of programs don’t receive half of the money that has been given to them. Anyways,  I got to immunize some of the children so that was really cool and surprisingly really easy.  All it consists of is two drops from a vile containing about 20 full doses of polio boosters. The booths were set up in bus stands, in health centers, even in half of a store that the owner donated for the day. The next day after almost every family came on their own to get their children vaccinated, were door to door checking to see if the families had received the service.

And today marked the beginning of my birthday celebrations! Tonight we went out to a Hookah Bar and had some delicious Oreo milkshakes and Pan Masala Hookah. My roommate and her friends came and surprised me with a birthday cake that read “happy birthday Tmily”. Apparently Priyanka’s Es look more like Ts. Fun fact about birthdays in India: when they buy you a cake, they expect you to eat most of it… like half of the whole freakin’ cake. Everyone takes turns feeding the birthday girl/boy and most times smearing it all over their face (I avoided this part very tactfully). And then later on when back in the hostel. A few of the girls came in and gave me some birthday bumps which is when you’re grabbed by your legs and arms and hurled in the air the same number as how old you are turning. I can definitely say I had a typical Indian Birthday though and that makes me happy. We were invited last minute to go onto Manipal’s Chancellor’s personal boat tomorrow night so that will be a very fun end to my birthday I believe and will keep my mind off of the fact that I miss everyone back home terribly and I wish I could have them all here with me.

Photos - February 11th

 Adorable little girl at the Daycare

On our way to Sringeri Temple and Agumbe Rainforest earlier today. Both were way up in the western Ghatts.

At the Sringeri Temple

Monkey Family just chillin in the tree, but don't be fooled, they are viscious creatures who steal cameras.

February 11th

I cannot believe I’ve been here for three weeks already! Time is going fast here, but I guess that’s a good thing. And if this past week is any indication of what to expect down the line, I doubt it’ll ever get boring here. I started out the week in a very Zen mood after having our first yoga class and Ayurvedic practical class all before 10 am. Yoga is about a 20 minute walk away at 6:30 in the morning. It’s held in the living room of our professors house which is so cool and very academic with books everywhere and a whiteboard with philosophical fleeting thoughts scribbled all over it. The class itself is a lot of philosophy and explanation of the reasoning behind the movements which I prefer that early as opposed to power yoga. In Ayurveda we were taught about a certain type of massage that is very therapeutic and since we are serious students in that class and need to fully understand the material, I was forced into receiving a full body hot oil massage free of charge.

Tuesday and Wednesday consisted of classes and trying to figure out exactly what’s expected of us. A lot of information is getting lost in translation but that’s just something we’ll have to figure out as we go.

Thursday was another visit to the Maternal and Child health care center where we observed some more and learned from the workers who were on staff. Some of the kids remembered us from the adjoining daycare and this time they found my camera and I discovered that they love to have their picture taken. Later that day we had our first Hindi lesson but the only thing I remember is ‘Meranam Emily Hai’ which means my name is Emily. There is nothing familiar about Hindi at all and I can tell I will struggle with it already.

Friday’s field visit was really awesome.  Instead of going back to the health care center, Dr. Shastry took us to meet Lakshmi, a mulit-purpose health worker that went door to door to her patients’ houses (sound familiar mom?), and let us listen and learn from the services she was providing. We went to several different houses all of which were of different economic standing. There was one house which compared with others looked like a mansion and belonged to a family of engineers. The women who we visited here was 9 months pregnant and had returned home to her mother’s house to have her baby. This is common practice in India and very rarely is the father there for the birth or the first month  following. We also saw rural families living in very poorly built huts that would surely wash away during the monsoon season or at least flood the place with mud which was of course upsetting but reality. There were also homes that were not BPL (below the poverty line; 17000 rupees/year) but still had 8-9 people living under one roof who all had an issue of their own. I found I learned a lot more from this trip from any other so far and every house we visited was so kind to us even though we felt as if we were invading. I have an idea that if Lakshmi will allow me to accompany her weekly on these visits that this may be the source of my research project I need to complete by the end of the program here. I could take down the basic data in each home (name, age, condition, complications…) and create a report based on what I find. I haven’t gotten this approved yet but I will work on making this possible tomorrow since we don’t have class.

On a less nerdy and academic note, today we went to a rainforest reservation and another temple way up in the beautiful western ghatts. We saw elephants and giant fish and monkeys and flying lizards and flying squirls. The rainforest is one of the wetests spots in India and is one of the top Biodiversity hotspots in the world. We got blessed fruit from a guru whose name is too long for me to even try to remember and ate a soupy meal of rice, dal, and sweet with just our bare hands while sitting cross-legged on the floor.

February 6th

6:30 am yoga, 9 am full body ayurvedic massage, 11 am cat nap, 12 pm chocolate croissant, 2 pm lecture on Indian philosophy, 5 pm Bharatnatym Dance. I told you all India would be awesome.

 At End Point, a garden that overlooks all of Manipal

 Outside of the Primary Health Care Center

On St. Mary's Island just before the sun went down.

February 5th

India has been keeping me busy since the last time I blogged. We went on our first field visits on Thursday and Friday, and the rest of the weekend was quite an adventure. Homework is already pilling up and its 9:30 pm and im ready for bed. Such a loser.

On Thursday morning we met with Dr. Sanjay, our Maternal and Child Health professor, and he briefed us on what to expect in the class. The words live birth, crying babies and vaccinations were the main points of conversation and although the majority of these things terrify me I think I’ll really have a lot of cool experiences in this class. After the briefing, we were sent by bus to one of the Maternal and Child health centers a little ways outside of Manipal. We witnessed some polio vaccinations and a lot of babies coming in for their checkups. Most babies were accompanied by their mothers and their grandmothers. We only saw a few fathers but there was one grandfather who was so proud of his granddaughter that he wanted us to hold her and show her off which is so cute to see. Since we were there for a while, and we had to take turns going into the small rooms where everything was going on, I took the opportunity to play with some of the kids who were at a daycare center in the same building. Although they couldn’t speak English, playing is a universal kid concept so we had a great time regardless.

On Friday, we had our second field visit of the semester to a primary health care center. This time our teacher was able to come with us so it ended up being more informative than the trip the day before. He gave us a tour and lectured us the basics of India’s health care which is that the government pays for almost everything. No one is ever turned away if they can’t pay the nominal fees for drugs and surgeries, but the spending on the center itself is very low. The doctor who we were introduced to couldn’t stop seeing his patients while we talked because the center was incredibly understaffed. We watched him pay bills, take a man’s blood pressure, record all of the data and then clean up because he was one of two people on duty for a center that served an area of 30,000 people. He then told us he was in charge of 4 sub-centers also.

Friday evening we were invited to the Annual Day celebration for the Hospitality and Restaurant college on campus. After sitting through a lot of awards we were treated to a performance that featured a mix of hip-hop, traditional Indian dances, a lady gaga-esque fashion show and some fire jugglers. Then we were served a meal that consisted of over 27 different dishes. Too much decision making for me.

Then finally on Saturday we left for St. Mary’s Island. It took us two buses and a ferry to get there but after asking for a lot of directions and getting lost in a fishing yard we finally made it to the Spring Zouk Festival. It wasn’t what we thought it would be to say the least. There were a lot of foreigners there looking extra grungy with their backpacks and dreads. And we made a few acquaintances but for the most part we just enjoyed being on a beach for the sunset. The music was non-existent until around 8 or 9 which was a bummer but we made the most of it and left shortly after to go back to our nice clean beds. So no camp out under the stars for us but still it was an interesting adventure.

Today, Sunday, we went back to Mangalore to do a little more shopping. Ok a lot more shopping but it’s worth it once you consider the exchange rate (50 rupees for every dollar) and how beautiful all of the clothes here are!! Plus I found a few gifts to bring back home for my family that I think they'll love. 

February 1st

So I’ve had two very full days of class already and my brain is completely fried. It’s not necessarily harder concepts or thoughts (except my philosophy course which sometimes makes me feel like I can’t even speak my own language), but the amount of work that they are expecting us to do has become a little daunting. I have a feeling that sleep is going to become a strange foreign concept very soon.

I don’t want to bore anyone too much but I actually thing my classes are kind of awesome so I’ll give an overview of each of them; feel free to skip to the end if you just want to hear what we’ll be doing this weekend!

Starting next week I will start my mornings on Monday, Tuesday and Thursday with a 6:30 am yoga class. Yeah I know, me wake up at 6:30? It won’t be pretty but I’m determined to try! Dr. Meera will be teaching it and she has told us that she gives a lot of yoga history and philosophy along with our classes so it will be interesting to compare it with the classes I’ve been to in America.

After yoga all of my classes begin at 8, except for Friday and Saturday when the times for our field visits change weekly. On Mondays and Thursdays I have a 3 total hours of Ayurveda, which is a class focusing on the traditional form of health care of the same name that is holistic and preventative in nature. The really fun part about this class is that there is an hour of practicals each week which are when we get to either experience or observe the treatments we are studying which basically means FREE MASSAGES!! Let’s just hope I don’t fall asleep and drool on their special treatment table! On Tuesdays and Wednesdays I have 3 hours total of Global Health Problems which is a basic public health class, nothing too exciting or extraordinary there but it also one of the courses I’m taking which counts towards my major back home so that’s good. Indian Intellectual Traditions is the philosophy course that I mentioned earlier when I said I felt a little over my head. I’ve never taken a philosophy course and I’m not even sure why the heck Dr. Meera (same lady that does yoga) let me into that course. Yesterday’s course was all about trying to decipher what we mean when we talk about our ‘self’. Is it purely a name or identity? Is it our mind? Our body? Or our soul? Is it eternal? Is it an accumulation of experiences or is our ‘self’ predetermined? All of these questions and no answers. So. Frustrating. But the hardest part is that it is dealing with Indian philosophy and I know even less about that than western philosophy. We’ll see how that ends up but needless to say I’m skeptical of my capabilities here. Maternal and Child Health meets every Thursday from 8 to 12:30, so tomorrow will be my first class. From what I’ve heard, after an hour of lecture, discussion and theory, we will be doing field visits every week to different clinics, schools, and women’s shelters to see firsthand what we are learning. Seriously, so cool. There is also the class that Ginny is teaching called Contemporary Indian Studies which is basically an all-encompassing course on Indian history, politics, and culture. This class also does a lot of field visits on friday mornings to various places.

On top of all this I have an online reflection course for Arcadia University, I’m taking an optional Hindi language course to learn the basics, and I may or may not take the bharatanatyam dance class. Goodbye sleep and hello Indian culture.

In other news. I’ve found nutella and ritz crackers, yummmm :))))) and four of us girls bought tickets to go to a music festival this weekend on St. Mary’s Island. A lot of people camp out so we may decide to join them but for now we are planning on coming back to campus to sleep on our hard but clean beds. Also even though Manipal in the day time is completely safe for girls to be alone, we all agreed that as four pasty white american girls at a trippy music festival on a seclueded island, it may not be the smartest decision to stay overnight on a used tent by the beach. Just a thought.

Photos - January 30th

                    The gang plus preston in Karkala (preston, emily, claire, hannah, myself, hannah and grantis)

   Statue of one of the 24 Thirthankaras which stands 42 feet tall and is made out of a single stone.   

 Another Jain Temple that reminds me of Indiana Jones :D

Fresh juice anyone? They've got any kind you want, Kiwi, Watermellon, Strawberry, Pomegranate, Guava....can't wait until mango season!

January 30th, 2012

Ugh i just wrote this super long awesome post and then I lost it, so here I go again...sorry if I seem super hostile and rushed but I have my first classes today so here is the condensed really lame version.

So I'm writing this post from my newly decorated room. Pictures of family and friends and a cut up Travelers Magazine does wonders for my boring side. I bought a new bedspread/pillowcase set and it came back from the dobi today. A dobi is a woman who washes your larger laudry items. I also have a woman who comes and cleans the room for us every few days. That may sound like a luxury and it really is but it also makes me really uncomfortable. I've been taught to do those things for myself, especially when I am a guest, so its hard for me to just sit there on my computer while she cleans around me. I try to talk to ease the one sided tension but she doesnt seem to appreciate that either so instead I leave and let her do her job without having me bother her.

I have yet to tell you about our saturday excursions to Karkala and Moodibidri. Two Jain pilrimage sights about an hour from Manipal. Jainism in a really condensed form is an offshoot of hinduism that stresses non-violence and a devotion to thier Gods. They are all vegans and the nuns and monks are so devout that they do not wear shoes and sweep in front of them so as not to kill any innocent bugs that may be in their path. They have 24 Thirthankars who are Jainists who have been thought to achieve the highest level of being which release them from the karmic circle and reincarnation and give them eternal liberation. The statues we saw today were of those 24 Thirthankars. So I made that sound super boring but its actually really cool!

After that orientation has officially ended, so we've been finding our own adventures. That night we went out to a bar with some friends we met from the geo-politics department and had a good time. We got back to the dorms at 12 so that the security guard wouldn't get angry about us missing curfew our first night out.

Sunday and Monday were spent doing a variety of things on campus. I've been to the gym both days because it is so nice and brand new. There must be millions of dollars of equipment and they have all kinds of courts to play tennis, badmitton, squash, and basketball. They even have personnal trainers walking around to help you out. We've also found the best fruit stand just around the corner that will make you a fresh fruit juice at any time for only 20 rupees which is only like 30 cents USD.

I have to go, I have a lot to do today. I have 4 classes from 8-9, 2-3,3-4,4-5  and then a concert at 6:30. The other girls wanted to go to the gym again today so if I have then energy I may join them at 11.

Pictures - January 28th

                                              The view from outside of the Krishna Temple

                                                Masala Dosa and a fresh lime soda...yummmm :)

Hannah, Myself, Hannah #2 and Claire with Priyanka (4th from left) and her fellow dental students after the Festival

                                                                         Shop in Udupi

                                                                        Sacred Cat? 

January 28th

      Ok so last time I left off talking about the beach house we stayed at for orientation but since so much has happened since then I will just summarize to catch everyone up to present day happenings here in Manipal.
      We've got a lot of information on how to act, eat, sit, dress, and interact in a way that was respectable and generally normal. For instance we can't use our left hand for much of anything especially eating since the most common subsitute locals use for toilet paper here is your left hand and some water. Also we always have to take our shoes off before we enter certain shops and even our own dorm rooms.
       Being a white women on Manipal's campus definately makes me a strong minority and that certainly generates a lot of stares, but we've quickly come to realize that the stares are nothing more than curiousity. People want to know where we are from and why we are here. So far there has not been any instance where I have felt uncomfortable or disrespected in any way. The students are friendly and they act and dress very similarly to students in America when they are not in class. When they do go to class however they dress up in a beautiful salwar zameez if they are a girl or if you are a male you are required to wear a button up dress shirt and slacks. Tonight we may be going to meet up with a few of the girls who we made friends with earlier on in orientation at a place called the sky lounge. Plans are still in the process of being made and we all may decide we are too tired to do much of anything tonight but I'll let you all know how that goes if it happens at all.
       My roomates name is Priyanka and she is very sweet and speaks english really well. She is studying dentistry and wants to come to America when she finishes school. This past thursday was Republic Day in India which is the celebration of their Independence from England. Priyanka and her friends were in charge of putting the festival together on campus and it really was a fun thing to watch. There was a marching contest and each area of study at the University had a group of students who marched to win some sort of trophy or award; Priyanka participated in that too and we met up afterwords and took some pictures with her and her friends. There was also a traditional dance done by a few girls and of course a speech was given by Dr. Kamath.
        Dr. Kamath is a 90 year old journalist and he has an office on campus where he is involved in academics and still writes several different columns and articles. We have met him several times so far and each time I become more and more jealous of his life. He has told stories of interviewing Martin Luther King, riding on President Eisenhowers golf cart and of course attending private sessions with Mahatma Ghandi. Listening to him talk at Republic day about the days when he had such an important role in the independence movement was an unexpectadly inspirational moment to the end of the festival. Plus he has the best sense of humour of any Indian I have met yet which makes him just the most adorable old man. Thinking back now I'm kicking myself for not getting a picture with him but that will just be another excuse to go to his office and chat some more!
       I know I'm jumping all around timewise with this blog but I forgot to mention what we did wednesday so I'm going to backtrack real quick. Wednesday was our first trip to Udupi, which is the nearest town next to Manipal. We visited the Krishna Temple and learned the story of why the diety statue is not facing forward like all other statues but rather sideways. It is said that long ago there was a man of the untouchable caste who was incredibly devoted and would pray to the diety every day until sundown, but because he was an untouchable he was not allowed into the building so instead he prayed through a window on the side of the building that looked in towards the statue. One morning the heavy gold statue was found by the groundskeeper to be facing the in the direction of the window and not the doors. It is believed that it moved itself so that the devout untouchable could worship correctly. Anyways I thought that was a very nice story. After we went to that temple, we walked around and got some dosas which are a food that is famous in Karnataka (the state I am living in). We later came back to Udupi on our first ever solo trip without Ginny and luckily we found our way around very easily and I was able to buy some really nice jewelery and some Indian clothes to wear to classes and around campus. Oh, and I was blessed by an elephant, which basically means I paid an elephant 10 rupees to hit me in the face with his trunk.

I can't believe that after writing that much I still have so much more to say. This will have to do for now because I think we decided that we are going to try and be social tonight so that means I have to get ready. I'll write soon and fill you in on all the classes I'm taking since I start them on monday. Wish me luck!
      

Pictures - Week one

Week 1

Sorry it has taken me so long to write in my blog. The orientation schedule here is so hectic and crazy that we all just crash when we finally get into our rooms at night. The heat and the constant lull of the fan in my room is a recipe for sleep too.

I guess I'll start from the beginning.  I arrived in Mumbai very late sunday evening and was met by Ginny, our program director. She had to send us (myself and two other girls who were on the same plane) to the hotel we were staying in for the night by ourselves. It was a very quick Hi and Bye and then we were on our way through the traffic of Mumbai. Which for those who have never heard, is scarrier than any amusment park ride or NYC cab trip I have ever seen. We all remark at how every turn is a heart pounding almost collision and yet it ALWAYS works out.

Throughout the week we've been doing a lot of bus and rickshaw rides to get to and from campus. Whether we were in Mumbai or in rural Udupi, the general look of India is almost always the same. The red clay earth creates dust everywhere and trash litters the streets no matter where you go. The outsides of buildings look centuries old and all the metal is rusted. Stray dogs are everywhere and I just want to adopt them all, especially the puppies who you can tell are still so sweet because everytime they see a human they wag there tail and run around you begging to be loved.

The outsides of buildings have absolutely no corrolation to what is inside them. Countless times Ginny and Preston (our assistant director) will lead us into a really sketchy looking place by most peoples standards and it turns out to be a skytop restaurant our even a lovely hostel like my own.

The food here has been absolutely delicious the whole time we have been here. The first few days of orientation we spent at a beach house about 20 minutes away from Manipal University. And the service we got there was unlike anything I've experienced in the US. Coming to India I expected to go without a lot of conforts but at the beach house we were waited and dined on all the time. There was constant supplies of teas and coffees and so. much. food. They made sure it wasnt too spicey for us but Every once and a while we'd all get a spice that made our eyes water and our faces get hot.

I have to go, we have a meeting with professors today and breakfast is first. i'll add some pictures and continue the story tonight when I get back. Love you all <3

Week -1 : Ready or not!

         The time has finally come where I am starting to freak out a little, and I believe it that this fact warrants my first ever blog entry. I have less than three days until I leave for India and there is so much to do and so many people to say goodbye too. I still need to call my banks because apparently a 19 year old girl from upstate New York making an ATM transaction in Southern India is a little farfetched. I also need to finish packing and then probably take half of what I packed out so that I don't have to pay the extra baggage fee. As far as my concerns go, my greatest and really my only fear for this trip is that I will either pack too much or too little. I personally think that packing too little would be worse but I am forcing myself to pack light and follow the instructions given to us by the Alliance crew. I've had so much time at home to get ready that I seriously believe that I'm starting to over prepare and over think everything, which results in me putting three more items in my bag every time I think of something new I might miss while abroad.
   Besides preparing to leave, I've spent my winter break enjoying my family, my friends, my boyfriend, my house and of course my pets as much as possible, because I know I'll be missing them all a ton while I'm away. I am very lucky to have such a great group of people who understand why I chose to spend my spring semester in a country so completely opposite from what I am used to.  They understand my obsession with travel and cultures and support me on my biggest and baddest adventure to date, and for that I am beyond grateful.
  I'll try to blog as much as possible while abroad but it may be a while before I gain access to the wifi on campus so please be patient (Mom that means you <3 ).