When I heard that we'd have orientation for two weeks, I thought my days would be light and everything would be spread out, WRONG! We start the day at 8 am and sometimes we're not done until nearly 8 pm. I think the last time I had trouble keeping my eyes open past 7 pm was when I was in elementary school. This is embarrassing.
The first few days we had logistical things to do, like introductions (thank God there were no icebreakers!) and getting photos and phones. For just about everything in India, you need a photo, including, getting a cell phone. So we all had pictures taken. After that we went to buy phones. There are only 19 of us, and 17 got phones. Yet, this took almost 4 hours! It doesn't seem so difficult. You buy a phone, fill out the information, get a sim card, it gets called in and presto! You're activated. Well that took 4 hours. Apparently time doesn't exist in India. Consequently, I've adopted my Malawi motto for India, "Nothing is guaranteed until it happens," and you never know when that will be, so I just kind of go with the flow. Between lunch and the phone adventure, the day slipped away from us.
That night we met our peer guides: Indian students who are about our age who were going to show up around the city. Everything was prearranged so I consider it either luck, fate, or both that I was put in the group that was supposed to visit various religious places. Needless to say, I went to bed excited.
My day in the city included learning how to flag down and bargain with auto rickshaw drivers, using the metro, and basic survival tips. I'll admit all of that was informative and very useful but all I really cared about was the "field trip." We traveled to Old Delhi and within 500 feet of the metro station entrance, there was a Hindu temple. Honestly, it wasn't that impressive but considering I've never been in a Hindu temple, I was ecstatic. Being able to name some of the Gods I saw was awesome. Upon leaving we were giving orange dots on the center of our foreheads.
Our next stop was a GuruDwarma or worship center Sikhs. It just so happened that the day we visited was a festival day; the birthday of a guru. Either the 9th or 10th, I think. Anyway the GuruDwarma was crowded but very exciting. I got to give offerings, see the various relics and simply enjoy the music that was being played. You have to take off your shoes and put them in the store room before entering the main part of the gurudwarma. If your shoes are dirty, need mending or polishing, the Sikhs will do all of that for free. As we were collecting our shoes, my peer guide, Neha, encouraged me and my fellow classmate Sarah Jane (SJ) and I to say a Punjabi greeting to some of Sikhs around us. SJ said it and the greeting was returned. I didn't want to say it to the same person so I simply turned around and said it to the first person I saw, which happened to be a man who looked slightly annoyed. To my surprise, he not only returned the greeting, but then in English he welcomed me to the gurudwarma and then gave us a tour and short info session about the Sikh faith. He then invited us to eat in the free kitchen which is open 365 and serves anyone no matter race, creed, or economic status. Neha was concerned that we might get sick since they definitely didn't use filtered water to cook with but SJ and I didn't care.
Let me just say that we broke a lot of rules that day. Instead of eating at a restaurant, we spent the afternoon eating from various street vendors which is a definite no-no. After arriving one of the first lectures we received was about not eating from street vendors. Whoops! I am currently just fine in case anyone was wondering.
After the gurudwarma we went to the Jamma Masjid which was built by the same guy who built the Taj Mahal. It was pretty awesome. I wasn't as impressed with the interior as I was with the architecture but we can't always be winners. The best part was that we got to go to the top of the minaret. It took forever to climb all of the stairs but the view of the city was spectacular.
Those are probably the highlights of this week. Everything else is kind of blah. We've gone to a few Indian restaurants but most meals, we eat at the dorm because we have a chef! He cooks us Indian food for breakfast and dinner. The only exception is that a couple of days ago he made us pasta and vegetables. It was good, but I like his Indian food better.
The rest of orientation has consisted of lectures about safety and registering for claseses, etc. AND, I almost forgot . . We started Hindi classes . . . at 8 AM! Seriously? I don't know who had the brilliant idea of making Hindi at 8 am but it is a disaster! Ok, that's an exaggeration. It's not that bad. I just hate the fact that I've got to get up at 6:30 for a class at 8. I can't wait until the 18th when classes officially start and I'll only have class twice a week instead of every day. So far we've learned about 10 of the 52 letters of the alphabet. We also have vocabulary and reading drills. Translation: I can read and write a few things in Hindi and I can have extremely limited conversations. Mostly I just know how to greet people and talk to rickshaw drivers. Of our assigned vocabulary, I know virtually nothing, however, I'm picking up a lot of food words. So many, that these days most of my conversations about food are in Hindi, rather than English.
I don't really know what else to say so I'll just end here.
Continuing to engage in adventures . . .
No comments:
Post a Comment