White Boy Magic; India

THIS IS THE BIG ONE- from our ship doctor the night before we docked into India. Every time we get into port we have 2 meeting the 2 nights before. One is cultural preport and one is logistical preport. At logistical our ship doctor speaks about health issues we are facing in the port. He has this cute hat that says “Dr. Dave” on it and has a red light. The light is off when we don’t have to worry, on if we should be aware, and flashing if we need to be cautious. When he came out for India the light was flashing, they also turned on the disco light, laser lights and played the song “staying alive”. Just a little precursor to India.

Before we pulled into port they started covering the carpet with cardboard and plastic. They also took in most of the deck furniture, covered chairs in plastic and closed many of the watertight doors to the outside. It was like they were in lockdown mode for India. The first and hopefully the only port that this happened for.

We got to Chennai on October 23rd and everything about it was different than what we have had to deal with so far. Customs was RIDICULOUS. They don't allow us to get our passport in India for some strange reason so we have to carry this onshore visitor passes and customs declarations for what electronics we are carrying (very strange). Indian authorities had to distribute these when we docked and I was just waiting to hear my name called and be questioned about my necessity of a 10-year visa but thankfully I got through fine. It usually takes us 40 minutes to clear the ship after it docks but here it took 2 hours.

The port was grossly dirty. not like garbage dirt, which I am used to in India but there is this weird ash everywhere. I guess they were right about covering every surface. I took pictures on my feet after the first day and it was DISGUSTING. I loved it. Drew and I met Bernie once we got off and she was right at the gate when we walked out! It was super nice. It was a 15-minute walk from the ship to the gate.

 Drew was in sensory overload for the first 3 hours and didn't really say much. I felt bad and like he wasn’t having a good time, but I think you just have to take in everything you are seeing and doing. We got on a public train within 10 minutes of getting out of the port, which I don’t think helped. Then we got in an auto rickshaw, which DEFINITELY didn't help. they are this little motorized things. wikipedia it only a picture can do it justice. not to mention whenever Bernie would haggle for a price she made me stand with drew like a block and a half away so they didn't know it was for a white person and then we would walk over and the vendor would try to change the price. We dubbed it white boy magic. We shopped around and wandered. We found this tiny fire temple, which was very cool. Chennai is know for being super religious, so most of their food is vegetarian and there are tons of temples everywhere.

We shopped around Pondy Bazaar and Spencer Marker. I found silk soy milk! I was ecstatic. this trip is making miss really weird things like fresh healthy stuff. When I get home I just want fresh spinach w. Italian dressing and goat cheese and soymilk. we had a great south Indian lunch Drew was in awe the whole time and I got my mango lassi and sweet lime soda! So, I was happy. We got dinner at this place called Hot Bread. I wanted Cafe Coffee Day, my fav coffee place in India, but this place was right next to it and had this delish looking sandwiches. so I got a chicken tikka Panini it was super yummy! We got very good cold coffee too. It was late by this point so we took an auto rickshaw back. Bernie left us and went to her place (she was staying on the navy grounds.) We had some issues with finding the right gate for the port. We finally got in and they checked our dumb shore passes like 5 times. we were finally right in front of the ship and I started getting shit. drew said it was the first time all he day he was happy he was the white kid. We called this “Reverse White Boy Magic”. The security people were questioning me and stuff because I look Indian. they asked my name like 4 times and asked me where I was from and all this shit. Finally, they let me on it was amusing. After we got back on the ship we found Kareem and convinced him to join us the next day.

Day #2 we woke up and headed out to meet Bernie. Obviously, Indian Standard Time made her driver late and we had to stand in the sketchy port area waiting for like almost an hour, but I had both boys so I was safe for the most part it was amusing and toasty warm. We piled into the car and headed to Pondicherry. We all fell asleep and after about 2 hours the car stopped. Pondicherry was a French colony and still maintains its separateness, so we had to get a pass for the car to enter. Dad had wanted us to find an orphanage to donate Jeramy’s sedaka box money to, but hadn’t given us specifics and Bernie I were both in a city we didn’t know. However, karma had it arranged for us. When the car stopped to get the permit we stopped directly in front of the Salt Children’s Home. Bernie decided we would go in and we met all the kids and the director of the orphanage. There were about 30 kids there in total and they were all super friendly. We got the guys credentials and saw that he was legit and the kids all seemed happy so we donated about $5000 rupees and took pictures and left. It was very random, but I think we helped out in a way that was more effective than if we just gave to another Mother Teresa Orphanage.

We got back in the car and headed to a commune called Auroville. Bernie has heard good things about this place from friends and in lonely planet, but we didn’t know exactly what it was. We got there and it was a little commune village with shops and a restaurant. If we had watched a video and gone through a basic training we would have been able to go into the commune, but we weren’t there for extremely long, so we just strolled through the shops and had a very yummy lunch.

After that we continued out to Pondicherry. We got there and found a hotel and then wandered around. We saw the Mother Pondicherry Ashram and walked around there and then walked up and down the beach. It was interesting to see how well the coastal area had bounced back after the tsunami.

We walked over to the shopping area and Drew and I picked out some glasses frames. Then Drew and Kareem experienced real Indian shopping, or at least how I do it. We went into this fabric/clothing store and asked if they had shawls they said yes and pulled the first package out. Then we started with the MORE NEXT words. And more and more shawls came out. Bernie and I were unfolding them and making split second decisions. Finally, Kareem started getting into it since shawls are the perfect presents for all his family since all the women wear them as head coverings. Drew was just hysterical the whole time. More and more shawls were flying everywhere and Kareem got out a pen and paper trying to figure out who would get which. After about 1 hour and over 100 shawls we walked out with about 20 in total. Success. Finally. Then we headed to dinner. I wanted Buttar Chicken, but since we were in Southern India and most of the cuisine was vegetarian this was a challenge. We found this one place that was a little sketchy, but the food was decent. Then we headed back to the hotel and passed out.

The next day Drew and I woke up early to head to the Internet café so I could skype mom and dad, but when we got there it was closed. He went back to sleep and I finished my book and then Kareem, Bernie and I headed back to the Internet café when it opened. It was a cute little place with nice drinks and a great signal. I didn’t get to talk to mom and dad but I got Tim for a while and even got to upload some pictures, which was great. All those people who said I wouldn’t miss the Internet and would get over it were liars. I am not addicted to it as much as I was but I constantly miss it. We then went to the Sunday market, which was a bit of a disappointment. After eating lunch we check out of our hotel and headed to Mahabalipuram.

Mahabalipuram is a seaside city that was a very popular port city in the 7th century. There are a ton of temples and other rock sculptures all around this area from the time period. We toured the temples and walked amongst all the rocks. There were loads of goats everywhere and it seemed like a local meeting place. Another main attraction is this giant boulder that is suspended on a hill. It is huge so we climbed up and took a bunch of pictures around it. We also got to go into a functioning Hindu temple, which was super cool.

As we headed back into Chennai stuff started looking familiar from the last time I was in Chennai. I remembered going to this restaurant in the trees last time we were there. I asked our driver about it and I was right! It had since closed but I was so impressed that I actually remembered stuff from 9 years ago.

We headed back to Chennai and stopped at the Citi Center, which is a giant mall and when we walked in I immediately remembered it from my visit in 2000. It was very strange going everywhere and recognizing things from such a long time ago. We left Bernie at this point and went in to find Internet and dinner. We got food at the rooftop restaurant, which was really nice and had great views of the city. Then we headed down to the food court and got some Internet and I was able to skype mom and dad. Then we headed back to the ship and finally got to shower and go to sleep.

The next day I had an SAS trip that I didn’t know what to expect from and ended up being pleasantly surprised. We headed to a rural village that was about 45 minutes out of Chennai. When we arrived a local woman whose sole job is “hospitality” greeted us. She was old and great and blessed us all and gave us dots. We were welcomed into a family’s home in the village and showed around. It was very interesting to see a different side of living in India then anything I have seen in the past. We saw their sleeping quarters, their shrine and the area out back where they cook all their food. It was explained how the entire family (extended) lives in one home. They offered us chai and then we continued on to other parts of the village. We had a demonstration on the white designs that are traditionally drawn in front of homes. We were told that the powder used formerly was made out of rice and was laid out so the small animals (ants etc) would have a little bit of food. Nowadays it is made out of a combination of chalk and rice powder. The woman who did the demonstration was incredibly talented and whipped out these intricate designs in minutes. After she showed us several of hers she asked us to try…which was a joke! We just proved how inept we are.

We hopped on bullock carts (carts pulled by bulls) and headed out to the rice paddy fields. As we walked out there we passed a super deep well and I looked at it and thought man it would suck to fall in that. 3 minutes after that a girl on my trip dropped her SHORE PASS INTO the well. This was a huge debacle and one of the villagers had to climb down into the well and retrieve it for her. People are dumb and careless/

We headed out into the fields to watch the women, in their gorgeous colorful sari’s, up to their knees in mud planting rice. They showed us how the rice is bundled and then placed in the mud for cultivation. Then they asked if any of us wanted to get in and help them plant rice. At first I was like hell no I am going to get a parasite in the standing mud water, but then I thought about it and was like hey next time I come the odds are I am not going to have a chance to wade into a rice paddy field so I took off my reefs and waded in. in my pink seersucker shorts. Up to my knees in mud. In India. Oh boy. It was super fun and the old Indian ladies helped me plant. Then we hopped back on the bullock carts and drove through the village. We headed to groves of coconut trees and they were whacking open coconuts and offering us the water. One of the villagers then demonstrated how he climbed the coconut tree and gave us the option of trying that. Rice paddy fields were enough for me and I did not participate in the tree climbing but some kids were actually pretty good at it!

After the village we stopped at a school and met some of the 12th standard economic students. We asked them questions and they asked us some too. It was very interesting and I thought it was really cool. They asked us all our names and everyone went through with the usually Laurens and Marys and the kids giggled at the weird names then it was my turn and I said Sanya and they all oohed and awed that I actually had a name they heard of. It was pretty funny.

Then we went to the Dakshinachitra Heritage Village. This was not particularly special or enlightening, but was interesting to see the developing tourism in India. This is a re-creation of different homes that are found in the 4 southern “states” of India. We had a nice lunch here and wandered around. They had several people demonstrating local arts and we even had the option of trying some of them. There were very talented artists and I even got some henna done. They also had some stalls selling VERY over priced arts and crafts. We headed back to the ship at around 4:30.

My friend Natalie and Drew and I headed back out to Citi Center where we met up with Kara. We just sort of hung out and shopped a little. In Chennai electricity is sort of a variable factor in life. We were shopping in one of the high-end department stores and the power went off for a solid fifteen minutes. So we stood in the dark and Kara was stuck in a dressing room and it was quite amusing…we didn’t really know what to do but finally the power came back. We got dinner (sort of) and headed back to our rickshaw and this is when the night sort of went downhill. Our rickshaw driver back to the ship was obnoxious. We got in a fight over the price and Natalie just gave him the extra money-, which I wouldn’t do, and it was just annoying. I said 100 and he agreed we got in we got to he port gave him 100 and he started screaming and was like you said 100 madame I said 150, it was a bad scene. I know it wouldn’t have happened if Dad was. I felt so helpless knowing I was getting ripped off and taken advantage of and being a girl and not being capable to doing anything alone.
 After we got the rickshaw thing handles there was this beggar that wouldn't leave me alone till I yelled at her to get away. Then bureaucracy of this port is extravagant and it was just annoying. They look at our shore pass 3 times and they are supposed to "sign us out" and then back into the port in this ancient ledger. They hadn’t signed us out when we left this time so obviously and they couldn’t find us to sign us back in.
 It was just an all around frustrating night, which is ok because every night cant be perfect!

The next morning pretty much everyone was back so Gen, Corinne, Sam, Kareem and I met up with Bernie for a shopping day. It was super fun and I got a lot of presents that I needed to get. We went back to pondy bazaar and made a serious dent with jewelry and blankets. Everyone was super grateful to have Bernie with us it helped a lot. I ended up getting a bunch of tunics too and Kareem got stuff for his nieces. Everything worked out really well. We finally had to say bye to Bernie so she could catch her flight. So we piled (5 of us and all our shit) into a rickshaw and headed to Spencer Market again for some last minute things. Sam and I picked up some horribly tacky leopard print pashminas, which were great. Then we headed back to the ship and that was that!

I think a lot of people really enjoyed India, but it was also an eye opener for a LOT of people. One kid actually went to Kashmir by himself…some people are so dumb. Our passage from India to Vietnam was pretty busy. We had the Crew Talent show which was amazing. They performed in bands, danced, sang and did stand up comedy. They are such an amazing group of people and are so dedicated to what they do and just so kind.

We also had Halloween, which was cute. At dinner the crew made a like "Halloween" menu and made stuff like borscht and called it blood stew and all that kind of stuff. The little kids on the ship trick or treated through some of our cabins. They threw a Halloween "dance" and there was NO beverage service. I haven't celebrated Halloween in 3 years without drinking and Gen and I do not plan on doing it again in the near future. We made a pact. Having a few drinks makes it a lot more fun to be in a costume. The dance was in the union and they had a costume contest and the student life workers did a thriller dance. It was fun and we all danced, but it was really weird not being at school. Halloween has become such a college holiday for me I was definitely homesick (school sick). Sam and I wore our tacky India leopard pashminas and made ears and were leopards. Gen and Corinne were dominoes and Drew was a ninja. People actually got really creative with the limited resources that we had. I was pretty surprised.

We also spent a whole day docked in Singapore refueling. It was weird just seeing the city all day but not being able to get off. Thankfully, I picked up their cell service and was able to call Emma Kate and Tim. With everything going on in Charleston I have really been thrown off kilter. I don’t want to say I am homesick because I am having a great time. I just don’t understand why something as major as what is happening in Charleston would happen when I can’t even be there to help. Drew says there is a reason I am not there with everyone dealing with this, we may not know what the reason is yet but eventually we will. I hope there is a fucking good reason too because it just seems like such a misappropriation of resources (it is the best way I can explain it as of now). Anyways, we all know everything is going to be fine in the end it is just a little rocky right now and I love you so so so much Emma!
That is all for now! Kisses and hugs from East Asia!