Thinking Out Loud

The weather is converting to a more pleasant, cool crispness that I'm beginning to enjoy. I mean, really. Who wouldn't enjoy wearing sweaters and having an excuse to pour a boiling pot of H2O into the bucket of morning bathwater? Winter is my favorite season of the year, and I believe it has begun here.

I woke up today to high pitched voices chanting "happy birthday". That was at 7:30 am. Of course I had to finish my dream, so I went back to sleep and woke up an hour later. Of course my dream changed, as they have a bad habit of doing after untimely breaks caused by singing children. Speaking of children, they no longer run ahead of me and say my name until I walk by. It's turned into more of an acknowledgement of my presence. "Hi Prigya!" is waved from twenty meters away, no running towards the girl that walks super fast and hops on running buses.

The posters are finally finished, and the exhibition begins tomorrow, while another exhibition ends tomorrow- the Bhopal Handloom Expo in the Haat Bazaar of M.P. Nagar. Stalls from Maharashtra to Rajasthan to Bengal to Kashmir have been set up since the 20th of November until the 30th, overflowing with fabrics that crumple like thin tissue paper, shawls that feel like soft snow, and colors that would make a rainbow look bland. I bought what I needed, a bag to hold my heavy items that would never fit in a dainty little purse. And there my shopping stopped, unlike Kate and Marie Jose who practically purchased half the expo. So I'm exaggerating, but their shopping genes were active in full force tonight. A cultural program was taking place which I enjoyed more than looking at stuff I knew I wasn't going to purchase. A talent show of sorts was being held on a green felt stage, reminding me of the perfectly groomed golf course I was forced to go to every Thursday during senior year of high school. I needed another P.E. credit to graduate, and golf was the only sport that was offered after school that didn't require you to be good at it. So there I was, me and Asma being the only females, desperate to pass this class so we could get out of it, surrounded by a bunch of over-enthusiastic fourteen year old golfers. It was then that I decided it was too boring to be considered an official sport. But that's just my humble opinion.

It's Been a Month!

So it's been a while, both since I've updated and since I've been at Sambhavna. About a month actually. Crazy how time flies, it surely doesn't seem like a month has gone by. And a month of what? Discovering the reality of what people really are, both good and bad. Demolishing my over-romanticized notion of the idea of social service, how it's not always a feel-good-warm-and-fuzzy feeling, that it does get frustrating at times when you were supposed to get on the bus going the other way but found out 20 minutes too late. Ah yes, the buses. A large portion of my mornings are spent travelling on their non-shock-absorbing seats, often squeezed between two overly plump women clad in burkhas. Yes, not wearing a dark body cloak that hides everything but your eyes is sure to draw attention, given the majority Muslim population in Old Bhopal where the clinic and many of the hospitals are. So its not as luxurious as my nearly-delapidated '92 Nissan Sentra back in Austin, but I do not mind it at all. Riding the bus around Bhopal lets you see the city through a different lens. The conductor's record-like announcements of the coming stops at a breakneck speed that would put the fine print orators for sweepstakes commercials to shame. The worst collection of Bollywood songs known to mankind blare fuzzily through the speakers conveniently placed right above your head for your listening pleasure. Running on and off packed compartments, losing sight of your arm amidst other arms whose owners are probably clueless as to what part of the metal railing they are clutching for their dear life. I know of the unpleasantries/random feeling ups that take place on buses, but I have experienced nothing of the sort in Bhopal, not even once. A seat is almost always immediately offered to the girl that stands out like a sore thumb on public transportation. Not that I dress in gaudy party wear, but I do not look at all like the dark skinned, sari wearing, burkha clad women that occupy the bus if at all. That is, if there are any women. But just because the bus is not overflowing with females doesn't mean I can't take advantage of the uber cheap prices that go with travelling at its finest. That was sarcasm, by the way.

The 22nd anniversary of the Bhopal Gas Tragedy is quickly approaching, and Sambhavna-ites are constantly running back and forth in hysteria, even if nothing gets accomplished. But a lot is getting accomplished. We will have an exhibition for 3 days in an auditorium, a candlelight vigil, a masked march, and probably more things that I am not yet aware of. So after coming back from the hospital inquiries during the day, I eat a hearty lunch which oddly enough is starting to taste amazing if I don't use a spoon, and apply my aesthetic talents (or lack thereof) to create the posters I've been assigned to work on. I compensate for my lack of artistic ability by using- to the point of abuse- stencils and highlighter markers. They do wonders, and I've received many a compliment for my first poster, for which I'd like to credit the neon greens and hot pinks that I've forced to grace the lime green paper. The color combinations might sound a bit odd, but trust me, it's fairly presentable. My feeble attempts at making bricks for a poster titled "Chemicals in Your Home- Everyday Items Can Be Harmful!" have come out not exactly as I expected. But if you look hard enough, they look like bricks. This is why I majored in Biology.

Salaam Bombay -The Other Extreme

I didn't realize how long my entries were until I looked at them myself, so I'm going to try to keep this one short...uh, shorter.

Where was I? Ah yes, we had experienced living with the financially-not-so-well-off for a few days, and once the protestors headed back, I saw a side of Bombay life that was on the other end of the economic spectrum. Kate has a college friend who went to Cornell's hotel school with her, and we stayed with this friend who now was the Project Assistant Manager at the ever so luxurious Taj Hotel. After being sandwiched in jam-packed trains for two days, we were treated to a driver who took us to an extremely posh and ridiculously expensive country club for dinner. Over the course of a day and a half, we mingled with the young elite of Bombay, the creme de la creme of Mumbai's 'well-to-do's. In the beginning it was nice, but after a while the exorbitant prices and almost surreal behavior of the people around me seemed to surround every situation with an awkward blanket of superficiality. Don't get me wrong, our hosts were wonderful and socially aware people- most of them grew up in the United States and were now working in India. I should have felt right at home then, right? Strangely enough, they hadn't heard of Mohammad Rafi, called Karan Johar 'Ka-rahn Jawhair', and kept mentioning all the things which made Indians such a wonderful people, in an almost tourist-esque sort of way. "You are more Indian than we are, Pragya", one of them remarked after I explained to him what a ghazal was. Bizarre, how you think the people you would have so much in common with end up being the people you are worlds apart from...

After the short-lived glitz and glamor of the rich and the (possibly) famous, we were once again plunked into reality when we boarded our train to Jalgaon. Four people were seated in our seats and patiently showed us that the ticket we had for 00:10 was actually for the day before. Funny how no one saw it before. Actually, at the time it wasn't really that funny, but in retrospect it does bring a smile to my face. Two sons of one of the helpful aunties on the train helped us obtain a 50% refund on our now invalid train tickets and purchase new tickets for the next morning, not to Jalgaon but to Bhusaval. Our sleep deprived morning consisted of taking the 6 am train to Bhusaval, a bus to the Ajanta caves, spending 3 hours there (absolutely stunning, by the way), and taking the bus to Jalgaon where we had hotel reservations at Hotel Plaza. We reached Bhopal the next day, and I can not tell you how good it felt to be back at the place I'm beginning to call home.

Salaam Bombay - The Insanity Continues

"Utho! Get up!"

It's 4:30 and some crazy man is going around, telling people to wake up at this untimely hour. It's almost as bad as Mammi repeatedly screaming my name on Saturday mornings, demanding I get out of bed when that's the last thing I want to do. Within five minutes, the bathroom is flooded by very aggressive women wanting to get ahead everyone else. People are already washing their bedsheets, slapping their wet clothes against the concrete which probably woke up the people that still managed to continue sleeping. I'm semi-awake at this point, and even though I don't consider myself part of the 99% percent of the desi population that drinks chai, I decide to succumb to it's warmth and suprisingly filling sweetness.

The day didn't start until 8 am when the protestors headed out to the InterContinental Hotel. They were outside the hotel's gates, some of them were chaining themselves to the metal railing. Kate and I had other plans, as being potentially arrested wasn't on my agenda anyways. Rachna suggested that we go inside the hotel and under some pretext, sit in the lobby and inform the individuals outside of what was going on. According to our story, Kate's father was participating in the conference, and we were waiting for him to come out and have lunch with us. The fun part was talking to people without them actually knowing why we were there. Initially, we sat down in an area that was also occupied by the lady that was organizing the conference. She gave us some information on what was going on that day and who was speaking, like the Union Minister of Chemicals and Fertilizers, a certain Shri Ram Vilas Paswan. We also managed to get some information out of two individuals representing the Italian Trade Commission, as Italy was the partner country for the conference. Our subtle inquiries didn't always have fruitful results. There was a guy with a huge camera and hence was presumably a member of the press but I couldn't decipher who he was with. There were two other men that were sitting near us in the lobby. It turned out that they were travel agents, and they ended up giving us a huge list of places to visit in Bombay. The Union Minister showed up only after we had left the hotel and joined the protestors outside. Kate, Tony, Jen, and Diana couldn't participate proactively since they weren't Indian citizens and could possibly get deported were they arrested. Fortunately for me, that wasn't a problem. And no, I didn't get arrested, even though there was a group of policemen and policewomen keeping a watch on our (very large) group of supporters. Finally, when the Union Minister's posse did approach the gate to the hotel (an hour after his expected arrival, go figure) he stopped on the road, got out, and walked towards us, accompanied by a multitude of security personel and flashing cameras. We had caught his attention.

I didn't hear what was said at the time because of the crowd that was densely packed around the center of activity. But after the minister had spoken everyone clapped, so I figured something positive had come out of the short interaction. Later, I found out he had made certain claims/promises such as Dow should clean up the Union Carbide factory site, the water contaminated families should be compensated along with the gas affected families, etc. I wasn't terribly impressed; he's a politician, and that's what politicians do best. I believe the success of the event was getting him to talk to the survivors and getting media coverage as a result of his political status. The next morning's paper had a huge picture of three hands chained to a metal railing. No story, but a picture. Some coverage is better than none at all, right?

We used the extremely efficient local train system to travel back and forth from the hotel and wherever else we needed to go. Men were strictly prohibited from riding the ladies' section of the train, something I witnessed when a man was running toward the train and happened to get on our compartment. Almost immediately a group of women stepped forward and demanded he get off the already speeding train. As soon as the next stop arrived, he was promptly pushed off, and I felt a slight wave of sympathy for the poor chap. Having a separate compartment for females didn't excuse us from being nudged, pushed, and bruised in general, not to mention pressed flat against at least five different bodies at a time. Whoever said females were demure had obviously never ridden in the ladies compartment of the Western Railways train.

By the third day in Ambedkar Hall, I'd gotten to know a few families quite well. Nafisa, her brother "Shoaib Akhtar", and I spent a lot of time talking to each other. Two sisters, Yasmeen and Nasreen wore matching green suits and kept insisting that I wear their nice clothes, because the white salwar that was brown by this point just wasn't doing it for me. That morning I had woken up before the other volunteers and managed to squeeze in a bath at 5 am when the crowd of women was not terribly dense. While I was attempting to update my journal in the pre-dawn light, one of the older women with a honey-sweet raspy voice volunteered to braid my hair. I agreed (there was no reason not to), but wasn't expecting her to actually comb it. The pain of detangling my unwashed locks reminded me of the good ol' days when Mammi used to fix my hair every morning and put those huge, currently unpopular yellow ribbons in it. When my hair was throroughly combed and tightly braided, I felt like a young girl getting ready for school. More importantly, I felt a strong sense of acceptance in this community I was going to be in for six months. After the goodbyes and see-you-in-Bhopals, only a few people remained. Our train to Jalgaon was not this night, but the next. We had a whole day and a half to explore the city. So that's what we did, and the Bombay that I saw was so different from anything I'd ever seen before...

Salaam Bombay - Beginnings

Mumbai: the metropolitan hub of India, where the richest of the rich reside with the poorest of the poor. It's a city of culture, of theatre, of film and glamor, of trends and nightlife. It's a place of extremes and diversity. It's also where more than three hundred people gathered to protest the wrongdoings of chemical companies, to make sure that the world doesn't suffer through another "Bhopal".

My escapades began last Tuesday, November 7, when we took the Kushinagar train to Bombay through a not-so-thrilling 14 hour train ride, reaching the City of Bollywood at a very early 4 am on November 8. I knew we'd have a little difficulty when as soon as we got of the train, we realized we weren't at Mumbai CST, the station our ticket claimed to stop at. CST, we presumed, meant Mumbai Central, so we took a cab to that station, only to find out that 1) Mumbai Central only had local lines and 2) Mumbai Central was not Mumbai CST. In fact, it was Victoria Terminus, something which we are somehow supposed to know because of course, the two sound so alike. Oh, Bombay...

So at 6 am we are finally at Mumbai CST, exhausted and hungry. After a refreshing masala dosa, Kate and I head out to find Ambedkar Hall, the place where we will be staying the next few days. According to directions, we take the local train, get off at the Dadar station, and head in a direction which we think is east. Of course, since nothing can possibly go right, it turns out being west. But because there are no arrows pointing out directions in this chaotic city we walk till the very end of the road we are on, because it also happens to be the direction multiple people point us to when we ask where Ambedkar Hall is. But people never really know what they are talking about, so in retrospect we shouldn't have listened to them. Not that we had a choice. Upon reaching a dead end bordered by a stony beach, we enter what seems like a memorial to the great Mr. Ambedkar. We are told that this is the Ambedkar monument and not Ambedkar Hall, which is on the other side of the railway station. Sigh. Arrows pointing out directions could have definitely come in handy at times like these.

It's 2:45 and we've finally reached the humongous tent of a structure we were supposed to reach a few hours ago. Famished, we are greeted by a multitude of women who smile and hold our hands. I'm feeling rejuvinated already. The food consists of rice and dal, and I kid you not, rice and dal never tasted better than at that moment. We are told that everyone is heading out for a protest at 3 pm, which by now is 3 minutes away. So we rush to finish our food and head out with the throngs of men, women, and children that traveled over 700 km to express anger, passion, and disapproval at what was happening in one of the most posh hotels in Mumbai- India Chem 2006.

Only the largest chemical conference in the country, India Chem 2006 (http://www.indiachem2006.com/) was to be held from Nov. 8-Nov 10. We protested chemical companies' exploitation of the disadvantaged by standing along the road by the Andheri train station. Large yellow and blue banners, photos of the living dead were held high by the wrinkled arms of old women. Children passed fliers detailing the crimes of Dow, and passerbys going up and down the station's steps had no choice but to see the faces of these children, the faces of corporate double-standard. Men were present as well, and their baritone voices rang loud and bold as they responded to Sathyu's call. "Ladenge! Jeetenge! Ladenge! Jeetenge!" We will fight, and we will win- they knew what they wanted and weren't afraid to demand it. Professional cameras lined the other side of the railing, but I didn't see anything in the paper until after the second day of protesting. Two hours later, the older men and women were getting tired. Some of them were sitting on the road because they couldn't stand anymore. But the place was still packed with energy, the chants still ringing high in the air. The purpose had been to make a statement- we are here, and we haven't forgotten.

Any exhaustion that had disappeared during the infectious enthusiasm of the protest quickly returned as soon as we got back to the hall. Each family had their section of the hall territorially marked out by a bedsheet they had spread on the stone floor. Yet the sheet was by no means a wall, and people interacted with each other, moving from one sheet to another. I did the same, and each 'house' that I went to was as warm and welcoming as the next. People talked to me as if I was one of their own, and that was a great feeling, knowing that you are not seen as an outsider amongst a people you want to work with. I met a few girls around my age and we talked for hours about their lives so vastly different from mine. We helped prepare some materials for the next day of protesting, and enjoyed a dinner of sabji, roti, chawal, and dal. Despite a not-so-great start to our day, it had turned out to be more than I could have hoped for. The warmth and strength of the people around me was greatly motivating, and I felt like I was a part of something amazing, something that words really can't do justice to. Words also can't describe how tired I was by 11 pm, and after a brief struggle to use the ladies bathroom shared by over a hundred women, I finally crashed - metaphorically, that is.

Lie after lie after lie after lie....

So for those of you that were lazy and didn't read the gigantuous five posts before this one, I am doing a project trying to disprove the Population Based Cancer Registry's claim that it goes to these 64 hospitals in Bhopal and Indore and collects cancer data from them either daily, weekly, monthly, or 'as and when required'. The lack of existence of any sort of system in the hospitals I've visited so far makes it really easy to disprove the PBCR. I've gone to Jawahar Lal Nehru Hospital and Ayushman Hospital, and in both they claim that they themselves don't record the number of cancer patients they get, or even the number of cancer patients that they diagnose. In fact, they refer patients to the cancer hospitals, but they don't even record the number of patients they refer. Big surprise? I think not. Logically, I conclude that if the hospital itself doesn't have a record of cancer information, then how is the PBCR saying they collect cancer data from these hospitals? Yea, I know. These people are pretty good at lying.

Other than work, there have been other things that have been keeping me busy, like sewing. For some reason, the white salwar that I wear oh-so-often seems to enjoy opening at the seams, and that too very subtly. It's not until I was sitting cross legged on my bed, enjoying the freedoms of eating Haldiram's namkeen one fine evening, that I noticed this gaping hole in my salwar near my shin. And of course, as any logical-minded human being would do, I got out the thread and needle that had been conveniently provided for us and started sewing. I've had to do it twice now, and noticed an opening in a third area which should be closed...I'm guessing it's from washing the clothes so often. But washing them with biodegradable soap is kind of fun - makes you feel all warm and fuzzy inside :) The smell isn't the greatest, but hey, they turn out clean. What more could I want?

I'm beginning to venture out by myself more nowadays. It's usually during the day and involves menial tasks, like going to the chemist's to get some cream for the mild infection my recently pierced nose decided to accept without consulting me. One of the girls that work in the computer department suggested getting this thing called "eye tubes" which is a cream you put in your eyes, but I would be putting it on my nose. Interesting, no? It's actually working quite well, and I got 4 of these tubes for Rs. 1. Nose rings can be quite uncomfortable at times, I haven't gotten to having a loop moving around in my nostril yet.

And the food, oh the food! I love the food here, probably more than the people, though the people are wonderful as well. I guess that makes me a bad person, but that's ok- I really like the food :)