A Real Christmas Story

While they were there the time came for her to give birth. She gave birth to a son, her firstborn. She wrapped him in blankets and laid him in a manger, because there was no room in the hostel. (Luke 2:6,7)

This year, I was meant to spend Christmas in Kumily, a hill station in Kerala famous for tea and spices. Instead, the host for the week could not accommodate our group. Even as we persisted, suggesting we find our own lodging in town, he said a visit would be impossible and told us to look elsewhere. We were officially turned away at the inn.

As the highlight stop on our 8-week trip, we took a hit. We felt the loss of the destination – we had been looking forward to the visit for some time. We got rejected, like we had been pushed aside for other priorities. Lastly, we felt the challenge of having been pushed out on a special occasion, a time when we just wanted to be near family and celebrate an important day. To be sure, this was the closest I’ve ever identified with the real Christmas story in my whole life.

With a week of time now available and with only one week to plan for it, we now had a unique opportunity. Nigel and I brought it to the group, suggesting each take some time to consider it and to try and search for what might be right for our Christmas.

To my surprise two people came up with the same idea: Pondicherry. The old French colonial city looked close on the map they had seen in their respective journals and both thought it might fit. As we had no other real leads, we took it on board. Curiously, a couple of hours later we got a phone call from the couple that would be joining us over the holidays – knowing our dilemma but not knowing the aforementioned conversation, they also suggested Pondicherry. A further call that night to two senior members of our team traveling in Gujarat gave rise to the same thought. It seemed more than a coincidence. We had found our star Star of Bethlehem and set to work on finding our way there.

The road would prove difficult. We took things into our own hands, knowing that we would have to exhaust very contact to find a place in the tourist destination in a holiday season. We had lots of secondary contacts through friends in South India so we began asking them to make calls on our behalf. From bankers and school teachers, to Catholic fathers and shop owners and even a few strangers, we mentioned the idea to everyone. Loads of phone calls went out across South India.

But nothing came back and the days started counting down. Our best contacts came up with little. Housing 11 people in one place seemed impossible. Beyond that, they couldn’t their seemed no rooms available in Pondicherry at a price that would suit us. Not by a lot. Most quotes came back at two to three times the money we had to spend and those were the reasonable rooms. Was our leading off base? Was Pondicherry just some happy dream we’d had that would disappear in a moment?

We persisted. A trip to a conference in Coimbatore brought some new options, but again, nothing came through. It started to get desperate and we settled in on a plan B. We would leave Salem early for our next town. Christmas, it seemed, would be in Coimbatore.

But something happened at that conference. My friend Nigel was sitting in the meeting hall and had a clear thought. “Francis, the professor from Dharmapuri will be the one who pulls through.” It seemed a far off possibility. We had met Francis on only two brief occasions a week earlier and he had little knowledge of who we were or what we did. But, he did live in Pondicherry and he was going home for the holidays. He seemed like out best shot and we held out hope for it.

We spoke to him two days before we would need to leave and nothing had come through. But on the eve of our departure (either for Pondicherry or Coimbatore), we were back in Salem and we got a call from Francis. Through a friend of his brother, he found a place that had 11 beds for us and right on our budget. Impossible we thought. No one had even sniffed anything near to this kind of offer. We brought it back to the team, setting out a clear understanding that this “to good to be true” offer, was certainly likely to be so. I told everyone to lower their expectations, thinking something must be off, but everyone agreed and we had a goodbye dinner in Salem before packing up for the beach.

It was a risk. The bus ride would be 7 hours and we didn’t know much about what was at the destination other than a promised hotel room and our new friend and lifesaver Francis. (And actually, he couldn’t get early leave from school to receive us, so we would be picked up by an Indian-Frenchman name Gerrard at the bus stand). Two legs later we rolled past the coconut trees and through the gates of the city. Opening the door onto the dusty platform of the bus stand, we felt the hot Southern heat pour down on us in the mid afternoon. “Well, I thought, we did our part. If this is a journey on faith, then we did it. We’re here.”

I turned to my phone and dialed up Gerrard’s number. He couldn’t understand much of what I said, but true to Francis’s word, he was at the stand and we quickly found each other. Within another few minutes we had boarded our 8-weeks of luggage into three auto-rickshaws and were onto the Raj Lodge.

We arrived at the inn. We waited. We waited some more. Lots of Tamil speaking brought up a lot of doubt in our minds. It seemed one room for four was available, but our other seven beds were out. End of the road. But then, the last Christmas miracle in this story. Somehow, through a bunch of phone calls and nudges, the rooms opened up. We had three guaranteed nights for the 11 fresh-arrivals. Incredible.

One big step of faith returned with one big grip of faithfulness.

We dropped our stuff and walked to the water, passing the normal sights that have become regular. The family of buffalo grazing on the local rubbish pile. The near-death flashes with out of control rickshaw drivers. The warm smile of the juice man. The desperate face of the beggar. Signs in Tamil and English started to include French. Basic Tamil architecture started to look more French colonial. Crossing a canal we got to the old French quarter. Tree-lined avenues and a big park for sitting. Feeling near the beach, I went to the head of the pack, eager to see the sea. We turned a final corner and saw the horizon.

In a strange euphoria, I whooped and starting running the final block to the water. As I ran I could feel that this was Virginia Beach – a fading sunset at my back heading into the coming dusk. It was a familiar run for me. I reached the edge of the sea and a massive promenade that rolled far down the water edge. I watched as the storm rocks broke the waves with the spray of high tide and welcomed the salt water on my clothes and face.

Fatigue

I collapsed today in the corner between a wall and the doorway to a church. Having taken up the place to relax my back while I scribbled in my book, my hand and brain ran out of energy after a few short paragraphs. With only a second thought, I nodded off in the warmth of the late afternoon sun.

When I woke up, I read over the words that preceded my nap. They communicated my clear fatigue.

For me, there is a difference between being tired and being fatigued. Tired is taking on a full day of yard work after a week of office work. Tired is after 2 days and two nights on an Indian train. It’s standing on your feet for three hours straight or pulling back to back all nighters.

Fatigue has much more to do with where one is emotionally and spiritually. The crushing blow came for me today when I officially recognized that, at the moment, I’m out of my depth in a few key ways. For one, I’m not taking on my usual position and responsibilities of program coordinator and project planner. Second, I’m working in a culture that doesn’t stress punctuality, which tends to stress out my group and me. Lastly, I’m working with a group that doesn’t process like me or manage itself in a way I understand well. To be sure, it’s not been easy to move these days.

I’m not using my best skills, so I’m challenged to adopt new methods and new tools. This process of adaptation requires incredible energy. Learning new techniques and struggling through the growing pains at 27 isn’t an easy task. Shouldn’t all things be a snap to me now? Instead I find myself taking on responsibilities for the personal development of my team and its individuals, a job for which I’m only harnessing my skills.

The key to all of this is that hard work and dedication only take on so much. They actually get in the way sometimes. For me, hard work can often be ego-driven. I can work hard because I think its impossible for me to not be capable of learning something. So the learning and doing process is more about me than about the people it’s meant to impact.

I’m developing two radical (okay, not radical and not even new) concepts for dealing with this fatigue.

Making myself available to a stronger force than myself. When the ego is clearly in the way, the challenge is to make room for something else to enter in to my thoughts and actions. It’s a process of realizing my own limitations and looking to tap into something much deeper, broader and exceedingly more wise and capable than my simple understandings and reactions. At some point, the ego becomes aware of its own fragility and demands to lean on an understanding much greater than its own.

Asking for help. In a similar vein, its seeking out the aid of others around me to help me with my development – to add insight where I’m blind, to lead the way when I need to follow and to encourage me when I stumble. This is terribly difficult for me. Afteral, it requires great humility. But somehow (perhaps the biggest surprise of the last 4 months), I’ve finally learned how to take feedback constructively and without defense, developed a sense of my own limitations and noticed the clear strengths of others in areas in which I’m deficient. It’s never easy to recognize one’s limits, we are, after all extremely complex beings with an innate God-sense that draws us to see ourselves as limitless. But whether we break an arm as a youngster and notice our own mortality or give thanks that some people like accounting when we can’t add up, limitations are powerful. They give us something to strive beyond while they also guide us to the people who can take us to the next level in partnership.

These thoughts have restored me from fatigue, but it’s the end of the day and I must rest. For now – I’m tired.

Majesty

That which stirs in us a profound sense of humility.

Today I saw something truly majestic. I’m not easily moved to such descriptions, never having seen a human-made structure that evoked the word. I’d apply it more often to a noble action or an incredible human feat achieved with grace. But of all possible usages, it’s only the natural world that ever truly moves me to this special kind of awe.

My understanding of majesty is limited to nature because it defies the human mind, having surpassed our own existence on into the billions of years – or is that billions of light years – its simply too huge for me to comprehend. And for that, I’m left with a sense of humility in the presence of majesty.

It’s not easy for 21^st century humans to consider their smallness. Especially in the west, especially in America, we are trained to consider our own projection as immortal – to consider ourselves without limitations. If you can dream it you can do it. You can be whatever you want to be when you grow up. Don’t let people tell you what you can’t do. These common messages surrounded me as a young person. And to much positive affect I might add. I am grateful that I’ve been in an environment that has supported the potential of my heart, mind and soul.

But on the flipside swells the ego: that critically important but highly volatile character. The ego, when told it is endless, so often pains at the sight of something so incredibly greater that it can be described as majestic. The endless doesn’t like to become aware of its limitations. Whether that be another person, an event or something great, its hard to welcome that which might make us feel small, humbled or limited.

It’s beginning to hurt me less. For so many years I looked at guitar players and thought I could out do him. Or criticized a book or essay believing I could add the extra that would make it great. I fooled myself by thinking that I had the talent, I just hadn’t yet invested the time. If I wanted to, I could. Afterall, I could do anything that I wanted to do.

However true this is, how far a combination of my natural talents and hard work could take me, today I realized that I’ve been missing the point entirely.

Majesty reminds us of our limits and does so in a way that doesn’t make us feel regret for them but humbly inspires us to use what we have in extraordinary ways.

Limitations are excellent instructors. They are boundaries to be pushed and at times broken. They also teach us discipline that can bring us to a much deeper understanding and realization of freedom. Most importantly, I feel limitations remind us that we exist in a world of relationships in which our variety adds great value to life. It’s far more productive and enjoyable to notice, appreciate and work with someone else’s skill or talent than to use it to stir the ego into an ill-advised tantrum.

Today I’m grateful for who I am and the road I’m on. The limitations that I’ve broken and will break in the future. Those that I respect and will guide me to understand myself better and work with others more cooperatively.

But above all, I’m clear that I want to be in relationship with majesty. To learn in the generous and graceful shadow of the truly inspiring. To work alongside majesty to pursue the extraordinary. And most importantly, to believe in majesty. Because with majesty, somehow, everything is possible.

The Reason for the Season

Chinese Joke – American Audience

Today, as I was waiting for our South Indian dinner plans to develop, my friend Yue told me a joke.

It’s important to know that Yue speaks excellent English and with a wonderful accent. But she’s also Chinese and I’m American and I’ve grown fond of our regular, natural and often humorous miscommunications. There are two other Mandarin speakers in our group (from Taiwan and Malaysia, respectively) and they feature here.

Yue: Do you want to hear a joke?

Chris: Is this a Chinese joke?

Y: Yes.

C: Definitely. Let’s hear it.

Y: What does a banana turn into while it’s falling out of a 100-story building?

C: What does it turn into? You mean anything?

Y: Like, what kind of fruit or vegetable does it turn into?

C: I don’t know, a banana split?

Y: (obvious confusion)

C: How about a mango?

Y: Mango? Why would I turn into a mango? That’s silly!

C: Yeah. I mean, I don’t know. I have no idea what you are…

Y: It turns into a cucumber! (hysterical laughter)

C: …(confusion leading into laughter because Yue is laughing so hard) Why does it turn into a cucumber?

Y: Because its green! (ongoing hysterical laughter)

C: …(still laughing, but trying to figure out what the hell is going on) Is that the color that Chinese people turn when they are scared?

Y: Of course! Now wait. What does it turn into when it hits the ground?

C: Um…Banana milkshake?

Y: No, it turns into a…hold on (checks with Chinese speaking friend #1)…it turns into a zucchini! (ongoing hysterical laughter)

C: (dazed confusion. At least I could find a way to explain a cucumber…but zucchini…I start laughing anyway at the general nature of the conversation) Zucchini?

Y: Yes! Zucchini!

C: Why does it turn into a zucchini? (laughing continues)

Z: Because its purple! Like a bruise! (laughter continues)

C: You mean a…

Y: Wait a second. (checks with Chinese-speaking friend #2) I mean an eggplant! It turns into an eggplant!

C: (with a laugh and a smile) Yes. Of course it does.

Glimpse of Tamil Countryside

We drove out to the countryside, passing by a thousand villager faces, bullock carts, goats, lunghis, sugar cane fields and coconut trees. Tropical greens, garland yellows, red bricks, white sumos. The roads deteriorated with each passing kilometer and we arrived at a small church along the way, some 20 kilometers from the closest town. We ate fish and biryani, papadams and chutneys. We navigated our way to a huge flood plain backed up by a rustic dam. Palm trees growing out of the water and children jumping of rocks and splashing in the liquid sea. I stood on the other side of the dam, thinking about the size and power of water. Walking past the buffalo underneath the mango tree, I arrived at a small temple in the shade. The local boys batted the cricket ball in a grove of gum trees as the sun poked through the green leaves to color my skin while soaking the unprotected valley in a powerful bright.

Unique Above the Rare

In a country as unpredictable as India, I’ve been surprised that over the past week I’ve found myself feeling locally acquainted with this country. Whether its a bull causing a traffic jam, a two hour wait for an appointment or a packing an auto rickshaw with 7 people, I’ve finally walked in the shoes of the sub-continent, head waggling my way through obstacle and joy alike.

At the moment I’m sitting in Salem, Tamil Nadu. Relative to Bangalore, it’s distinctively South Indian. It’s a smaller city with a stronger sense of pride – a true locals city. People grow up in Salem, live in Salem and die in Salem.

South Indians refer to South India as the real India. Unlike the north of India which has been invaded regularly and dominated by foreign rule for many centuries (Aryans, Mughals, British), the South kept an unbroken culture until the coastal arrival of the spice traders in the 1500s. Even then, it seems that the Southern cultures is dense enough to take welcome any newcomer into its fold, so long as they can take it (South India welcomed the arrival of Jews as far back as 2,000 years and the same for St. Thomas who arrived with the gospel in the first century.) This fact brings a strong sense of depth and an enormous pride to the people, the kind of pride you find in people who date their culture in the thousands of years, not the hundreds. I had a similar feeling in Rome and I’ve never felt it at home.

This is unmistakably different from my last trip to India. Instead of cruising among the light skinned and tall folk of the north, I’m with the shorter and darker neighbors down south. The written language no longer hangs from a line like Hindi, but rolls and rounds with the swooping curves of Tamil. Cold plains and Himalayas swapped in for jungles and hot afternoons. Meals served on banana leaves and not out of the tandoori oven. Trading in naan for rice, chai for coffee and mughal cuisine for epic thalis.

It’s sunset at the Salem Social Services Society. I’ve wrangled a plastic chair and perched on the roof (one of the absolute gems of Indian architecture is that most buildings have rooftop decks). Scattered clouds canvas the sky and gentle pastels add gentle flavors to the sky. Palm trees dot the skyline – their leaves nest into a dense thicket all around the third story of this building. My friends Martin and Kannan practice their kickboxing in the shadows; Tam takes her photographs off all four sides. The local church blasts Tamil devotional music through speakers collected in the apse. It’s time for 6pm mass. The boys below practice volleyball. Smoke rises from the coconut grove as earth and paper and plastics burn away. Sets of small, young, jagged mountains draw out the horizon and bask in the fading light. Evening will pass into night momentarily.

This corner of the earth, unique above the rare, blends with me.

Images from Bangalore

Miracleworkers of the 21st Century

For two weeks my team and I had the good fortune to deliver a 30-hour course at St. Joseph’s College in Bangalore. Formally titled “Leadership, Values and Action”, our class focused on understanding oneself (relationships, behaviors, values, etc) and seeing where a change is needed or desired. From there, we help them to develop a vision for action on those areas that have come to light.

But the kind of change we discuss is meant not only to bring a positive affect to one’s own life, but it’s the kind of change that brings real freedom in a life. When a life is lived with real freedom, the vision for that person grows and begins to include far more than himself. It extends to include many.

As part of our course, we took our students to a local boys home run by Don Bosco. From what I witnessed there, they are a group of people who have become free inside and thus available to work for a much broader vision.

Child abuse in India isn’t something you see in the open all the time, but its there. In the west, we typically think of child abuse as a drunk dad who whacks his kid now and again. Much of the time it is. It’s pathetic behavior that causes deep fears and insecurities. More common, I would think, is emotional abuse in which parents act as nothing more than grown up children, using their more sharpened mind to make immature power plays on emotions. It’s disturbing, but in a way, I understand it. It’s a function of broken relationships over generations and a difficult culture that can crush the human spirit.
This happens in India, but even this is not even remotely close to the underbelly of child abuse.

Perhaps what I see as the darkest thing in the whole world is organized child abuse. And its in India. And its not always hidden. In fact, sometimes it walks right up to you with a smile.

Throughout India there is human trafficking of children. Organized criminals partner with corrupt police, businessmen and politicians to use children to turn profit. Kidnapped children, swindled children and abandoned children are picked up off the streets in slums and trains stations and taken to situations of cruelty that are hard to stomach: Children sent out to beg in busy intersections and beaten unless they generate a certain return; Boys going to work in hotels where they work 20 hours days and are chained to the wall at night; Girls and boys working as slaves in brothels.

For a time I denied this kind of darkness in the world. I just couldn’t imagine a person falling so far away from love that they would destroy innocence. Sadly, I’ve come to accept it. But in that sadness emerges a possibility to change it. The people at Don Bosco have also seen this situation and they’ve gripped their faith and taken their hands to work in an effort to change it.

I sat in amazement as I heard the tragic stories of abused children and the lucky few who had been rescued and taken to centres for rehabilitation and education. The stories I heard made my stomach turn and stirred anger in my heart. By the end I was exhausted and in despair. Helpless. Even in the middle of the session, a 6-month old girl arrived at the centre, abandoned at the Bangalore City Bus Stop that very morning. The center averaged 6 or 7 new arrivals a day (In fact, a six-month old girl arrived while I was talking with Father Geo). And these were the lucky ones who were reported or divinely guided to safe hands. Many others would disappear, possibly forever of the streets each day.

I could hardly get down my puri curry at lunch. Even with all of their efforts, even Father Geo and Father Edward gave a sense of the size of the problem. The government refused to give them money to help address the issue, even after naming them the official government agency for missing children in the state of Karnataka. The roots of the crime dug so deep that even those on the “good” side of the law were entangled in the deadly web.

Still, a song rang out. It was a song of hope. A song that tells the story of one person who stands up for the marginalized and takes part in the redemption of the world.

With all the desperation and the tragedy of this situation, men and women were stepping up to counter it on the ground. With every reason to say “no, it can’t be done”, they were saying, “yes we can and yes we must”.

With a problem so big and entrenched that little can be done to affect root causes, a group stands in the gap to offer hope.

With a problem so huge, that group spoke in humility: We can not do it on our own. This is a work of faith. And it is only through faith that one can topple these walls. Our only answer is to face organized crime is with equally organized systems of justice. We must live out our answer with free and spontaneous acts of faith.

I left renewed. These were the miracle-workers of the 21st century: Restoring hope and faith to innocents. Giving them grace in human form. Life anew.

Afghanistan Really

There are many reasons I’m grateful for my job. One of them is that my journey through the world allows me to meet people who shatter my stereotypes and simple preconceptions by sharing with me a piece of their reality.

The first time I thought about Afghanistan was at my best friend Dwight’s house when we were growing up in Jersey. His Dad had the epic VHS collection and we found Rambo 3 in the midst of it. John Rambo’s run through the Afghani mountains fighting off Russian choppers with a bow and arrow still registers as classic 80’s action cinema.

It wasn’t until years later that Afghanistan took on any kind of real meaning for me and even then it was limited. Following 9-11 the world renewed its gaze on the country, learning about post-Soviet power struggles, the reign of the Taliban, Islamic extremism and the dope industry. But even with the news plastering headlines and the regular video rolling in, Afghanistan has always seemed a place that existed only in movies and in the television. Even a reading a recent National Geographic article about archeology in Afghanistan didn’t help bring it all into focus in real terms.

With this perception I arrived into my class on Leadership, Values and Action at St. Joseph’s College in Bangalore. I didn’t expect an Indian Catholic school to be so diverse. I met students from all parts of India and visiting students from Nepal, Kenya, Cote D’Ivoire and, yes, Afghanistan.

For reasons on which I’m still unclear, the class of 22 had 5 Afghanis, each articulate and eager to be key players in class discussions. Given their proportion and their single-mindedness on the issue of Afghanistan, I couldn’t help but begin to live into their experience. We had tea together and talked frequently after class ended each day. They were more than eager to share their experience of their country with those who had their ears available to listen. Given my country’s involvement in Afghanistan for the past 20+ years, I thought to get ready to receive a new dose of information.

The stories they shared about the past 30 years of civil war were heartbreaking. No one has been unaffected by the ongoing feuds between ethnic groups, religious ideologies and foreign power plays. I heard about the sights that no eyes should witness unfolding in front of a 10 year old. The sounds –a caucophony of suffering – aired for the ears of children. I was shocked to hear the students give an overview of their life from 0 to 18 as a steady downward slope (blamed entirely on the demise of his country), only redeemed by the opportunity to study in India. While many felt the strong urge to return to their countries and play a part in re-establishing Afghanistan, I felt an underlying despair for the situation at home. Three of them wanted to return and become politicians, when asked why, the salary and the stability seemed more enticing than the prospect of civil service.

The main national concern for them as men and women in their young 20’s is unity. The divided factions throughout the country are prey to the power-thirsty and unscrupulous. Hopelessness plays a major role in these divides. People tend to cling to those who can give them the smallest glimpse of an advantage, whether it be an empty promise or not. Even as they pointed out that Afghanistan has increased its national security (though it still suffers from the lawless tribal regions on the Afghani-Pakistani border) they said the biggest brewing conflict is over language – with major language groups squaring off over national language rights. Casually, they said, “another reason to fight.”

When asked about the US involvement, the answers I got were unsurprisingly muted. The nation that received the biggest criticism was Pakistan (not surprising for Afghanis studying in India. Note: Anti-Pakistan sentiment has completely inflamed in India since the Mumbai attacks. Tension continues to escalate along the line of control in Kashmir).

Last Sunday I received an invitation to spend the evening with them at their flat. Our host’s wife spent near on 9 hours preparing the meal and the gorgeous spread stoked our taste buds and inspired our stomachs. Over delicious and heaping servings of chicken, mutton and rice we discussed life in Afghanistan, a country full of real people doing things that all people do. Going to work each morning. Dealing with family problems. Cooking dinner together. Singing songs. As their faces and voices became more a part of my daily, their stories came closer to my heart. Just young people looking at their past, considering the present and moving into the future.

I walked out of the dinner with friends.

Lord Have Mercy! Catholic Mosquitoes in Bangalore

I’ve learned one interesting fact about mosquitoes this past month. It surprised me. Only female mosquitoes bite.

The point is not to make a case for what this says about females in general (pointing out generalizations in females is a topic I learned to avoid altogether many years ago), its all to say that I’m learning about mosquitoes because they are playing an increasingly important role in my life.

This may have started in 5th grade when I used a mosquito net for the first time and found it remarkably effective in protecting me from those mammoth beasts of New Hampshire. Or maybe its my friend Jeff and his doctoral work with mosquito genetics. Or at the very least the insufferable swarms that camp out at home during the summer in Va Beach. All said, I’ve made no friends of these bugs. I find them ruthless and senseless and have no issue giving them the squash. But in the land of karma, one could say that I just got bit…bad…

St Joseph’s college in Bangalore is a great spot. In fact, its one of the top 10 colleges in the country and I feel honored to be in residence here for two weeks delivering a course with my colleagues. But top colleges in India don’t look like the Swarthmores and Princetons of the US. This one looks great on the outside, but the inside is meager and my boarding space in the hostel is spartan. In fact, its meant to be a leg up (as I am a guest in the hostel). My friend Martin and I share a 10’x10’ space with a bathroom. It’s not bad for my standards, so we crashed in on Sunday night when we arrived. The few swirling mosquitoes seemed no problem.

Now I’d spent the last week hearing about malaria and anti-malaria medications and methods. Given my areas of travel, I decided on taking the “low-risk” of infection to the somewhat toxic anti-malaria drugs. But I did grab a mosquito net to bugger off anything that might come my way. Not surprisingly and to my subsequent regret, I was exhausted when I arrived into town, so I took one look at my bed and crashcd out.

It’s kind of hard to explain what happened to my face overnight. I actually didn’t even know until about midday Monday. I took one look in the mirror around lunchtime and noticed that my entire forehead was covered in red spots. It looked like a five year old had just learned how to make dots, found a red marker and used my head to test it out. I tried to look at it from every angle to see if it was as bad as I thought. It was and while the blankets had spared my body from the neck down, my friend Cheng confirmed that I received about 100 bites overnight. Somewhere between the thought and the actuality of that fact, I felt woozy. It didn’t help when I read back-to-back news articles, one about the rat fever currently in post-monsoon Bangalore, as well as the dangerously big packs of stray dogs in some sectors of town. Surely, I’d contacted some disease overnight – impossibly not. All these thoughts just in time for me to deliver the opening presentation at the college!

Despite the weakness, we delivered a crack workshop and I soon set to work on my battle plans for the evening showdown. Amazingly, I had my first experience in understanding excessive defense spending. When you’ve been burned and you think you got a method to deliver the knockout blow, you spend accordingly. Knowing that I couldn’t take another 10 bites, much less another hundred, I manifested my three-fold plan. First, seal all windows and doors and use a mosquito coil to smoke ‘em out. Second, acquire repellant and cover forehead vigorously with the highest DEET formula available (turned out to be high-quality Australian Bush DEET). And third, gerry-rig the mosquito net for ultimo protection. It took about 30 minutes to get everything right and I set off to bed feeling secure in my measures.

Amazingly, the plan worked to perfection. I woke up in the morning with my forehead still spattered like a Jackson Pollock painting, but no worse than the day before. I took my spotted forehead and headed out into a new morning.

Southbound

Getting on an Indian train is an experience I wish you all to have at some point in your life. It’s amazing really.

The train service is nationaliazed and is actually one of the biggest businesses in the whole world. It was made over by a corrupt minister from Bihar during his tenure as minister of the railway. Legally, he turned it into a massive money-making enterprise and by far the preferred method of travel for the large majority of Indians. To put it in perspective, it’s said that 2 million people are always traveling on Indian trains. 24 hours a day. 365 days a year. It’s a staggering figure.

That success in mind, it’s no perfect system. For one, the railway over books the trains. There are a couple of waiting list cars, but they attract few clients. Instead, those who have been waitlisted for “sleeper cars” often search out a spot to bunk, hoping that a properly ticketed customer won’t chase them off. More often, the ticket inspector accepts bribes from those with no tickets who just hop on for passage without paying for the fare. They tend to fill up the cabins and with corrupted authority, there is little that can be done to remedy a situation.

So with those two groups searching for any available room, space aboard the train is most precious. When the Mumbai-Bangalore showed up in Pune at 11:40, it was a hyper dash in.

It’s essential to get your luggage stowed and your seat properly accounted. Traveling with 6 neophyte Indian travelers was no picnic either, as I’ve only just honed my Indian traveling skills after 6 months and several train journeys across the subcontinent. We scrambled in, bashing our way through a crowd as dense as the polluted Pune air. All said and done (by miracle) we got all the luggage down and only struggled for 3 of the 9 seats (even with proper tickets, one gets smushed 4 into a 3 seater).

I smiled with satisfaction as we pulled out. There is nothing like the Indian train 2nd Class when it comes to traveling. Some might prefer the cushy AC 1st class, but for the real experience of India, you gots to ride with the real people. Everything from the open doors where you can hang your legs out the side and take in the passing farms, villages and sunsets to the stench of the latrine that lingers after 20 hours or so. It’s just a magical and raw place the Indian train.

The layout of the cars is simple. Each has eight six-person berths. Three sit on each side with a bunked bed on top. The bench will serve as a bed at night, as will an identical fold-down for the middle bed. At the foot of these beds is the walkway. On the other side are two more bunked beds.

This makes for exceptional theatre, as one finds that at least 8 people (up to 12) are focused in on the same spot at a time. Nothing goes unnoticed and everyone shares this experience of being together. It’s remarkable community and one can really see the genuine friendship and rapport that Indians build so well between each other. A train partner (s) can make or break a 30-hour journey. Indians almost always aim to establish the former.

My berth of 11 got very excited once I decided to start playing along after a couple of hours. I asked my neighbor about some snack being offered by one of the constant vendors patrolling the corridor. When I laid my 10 rupees down for the treat, I seemed to earn some street cred and it opened up a jovial hour on the train which included conversations on insurance, stealing water-wells (yes the things in the ground), Bush, the financial crisis and Obama. At one point we even discussed the differences between cricket and baseball. Here’s an idea of me trying to explain the differences between the two bats

“:You see, the baseball bat is about the same length, but skinnier, lighter and round. It makes hitting the ball a much more difficult job.”
“Yes,” my neighbor exclaimed, “I understand. But what you use for sport we give to the police to hit people with.”
Chuckling with the rest of the crowd, I admitted that it was true. But my neighbor wasn’t finished with his attempts at laugh.
“You can also use it to give your wife a good whack!”
I didn’t laugh, but everyone else did. I feared where this was going and tried to move off it.
“Yes, well,” I stumbled, “I think we can all agree that it’s best used for playing baeeball.”
Seeing my displeasure with his last comment, he concluded, mimicking the actions, “you can also use it to roll chipati (Indian flatbread)!”
Cue more uproarious laughter. You see what I mean. Theatre in the round

Station stops can be 5 to 35 minutes in length. It’s always enough time to hop off the train and survey the new station for a cup of chai, a new book or some travel grub. Typically one can find some puri (fried Indian flat bread) that comes along with a kind of spicy yellow dal or bhaji (buttered and grilled rolls with a red lentil masala). Both taste so good that you can’t resist. But you should unless you really believe in your iron gut. A bad bahjji can cost you on a long train journey. But a good cup of station chai can change the course of a day. Rolling on…

As I mentioned, there is also an omnipresent parade of people on the corridor. You name it – they show up. You’ve got your expected ticket inspector and occasional guard, but you also see any number of other randoms.

• The tea and chai-wallahs hawking their goods in unmistakably annoying tones
• The guy selling the random and lame toys parents buy to keep their kids quiet
• The kitchen man moving the train’s catering products up and down the corridor
• The dalit woman sweeping the floors hoping for a few rupees tip from her patrons
• A boy with no legs, using his hands to carry himself along the floor or ask for change.
• The blind man selling chains to lock up your luggage
• A boy with a painted on mustache, doing a stage show to collect a couple rupees for his owner
  

It’s raw India.

Another group you see on the train are those men, eunuchs or transgendered who dress up as women. Superstitiously thought to have magical powers, they are both loved and hated in Indian society. Loved because their wish can bring blessings on a child at a naming ceremony or hated because they can curse your existence and embarrass you in front of your loved ones. They clap up and down the train, bothering the men, who often toss them a few rupees just to go away. I tend to get away with playing the innocent bystander who doesn’t understand this culture (and its true, I don’t understand it, but I actually find them to be quite unshocking most of the time – I’ll save the shocking stories for another time). In fact, I had to laugh when I bumped into a couple on the way to the toilet. I asked if it was empty and they said yes. We even had a formal introduction of names when I came out – though I did move on rather quickly. The next morning, I went to the bathroom, first thing, with my eyes barely open. When I walked out, I saw them again.

“Good morning beautiful!” they shouted down the corridor.
“Good morning ladies,” I responded.
“We love you!” they replied with a laugh.
“Have a safe trip,” I said quickly heading back to my seat.
“You are leaving so soon?”
“I’m off at Bangalore.”
“Okay. Bye handsome!”

The action never ends. You can dream out the window for hours. Read heaps of a book. Talk about Indian current events. Meet a new friend. And on you go.

I’m off to Bangalore. And I’m looking forward to a couple more trains before this southern adventure wraps up.

India’s 9/11

I spoke with my family on Thanksgiving Day and they were eager to hear news of the events in Mumbai from the Indian perspective.

I showed them the headline from the Times of India, a highly circulated national newspaper.

“IT’S WAR ON MUMBAI”

The words read full across the whole page with a number of informative sub-headlines above the fold and the main headline.

Since I’m not in Mumbai, all of my reports have been either 2nd hand through conversation or through the newspaper. I’ve had no chance to watch any of it on television. They only time I’ve seen a television in the past week has been the New Zealand-Australia cricket match while I had my haircut Saturday afternoon.

But even in that flash of sport I heard the news advert interrupt and refer to this past week as “India’s 9/11”. It’s a country known for its sensationalized press (I’d say more so than the US), but the phrase rang true in many ways.

In a country fairly accustomed to bombings of public places in the name of politics or religion this event has stirred the social consciousness of the nation. It will being a change. It just a matter of when and how…

A few things I’ve noticed…

24-Hour Coverage. It’s been the first time (I believe) that India has live streamed this kind of event in their own country through their own television stations. Friends in Pune told me that people have been glued to their TV sets, even while at work, checking facts and seeing how the story would unfold. For most it’s been a harrowing experience to watch the tragedy come to life on camera, for others it has become violent entertainment, watched with the twisted curiosity that grows inside us when we see such things.

More Religious Conflict. On another level, there’s been an extremely angry response. Those who have not been shaken have often responded with anger. It’s a potentially disastrous cocktail. With Muslims claiming responsibility for the assault, it has injected those predisposed to religious conflict (which is quite a few) with a dose of unneeded adrenaline. Other’s I’ve spoken with have said that their quite ecumenical work colleagues have spoken about taking arms to fight in the battle. It’s a strange but, to some degree, an understandable comment with only a remote chance of manifestation. The problem would be (as has happened in the past) if the violent wing of the Hindu Nationalist ideology responds to this violence against innocents with equal violence towards innocents. Given that the country looks on this as a national tragedy, I would hope it’s a time when Indians stand together. We’ll see…

India-Pakistan. Whether it was intended or not (and reports have been very disparate so far) the violence occurred during a recent warming of relations between India and Pakistan, longtime rivals (and recently nuclear armed rivals) still quarreling over a number of issues, particularly the disputed territory of Kashmir. Recently, the new Prime Minister of Pakistan had made some important concessions regarding a “no first” nuclear policy – which means his government would not fire the first nuclear missile in a military conflict. He also made some statements about the rights of the Kashmiri people to their own government. These bold strides were received well in Delhi and on Tuesday the Home Ministers of each country had met to continue the quickly-thawing conversation. Those talks are now iced, with many pointing the finger at Pakistan as the origin for the militants.

Where Next? The US and the UK responded dramatically to major terrorist attacks on their home soil. How will India respond? With major international conflicts already underway in Iraq and Afghanistan, will India decide to make a bold move on the global level? Will the government seek to centralize power and tighten their authority and security over India (which happened once in the 70’s when martial law left all authority in Indira Gandhi’s hands during The Emergency)? Indian politicians have condemned the violence, but where will they lead the country?

I received this email from a supporter of Action for Life:

“Being born and brought up in Mumbai, what is happening there now has left me benumbed. I am saddened and aghast at the heedless violence, unprovoked and uncalled for. Life in Mumbai is no longer safe, as it used to be when I grew up. I am afraid now to move out in public, to mix with strangers or to trust people.”

It’s a different time in India. Some say this is a watershed moment from which Indians will mark time, like 9-11. But from the looks of Bangalore, nothing seems different on the street and aside from tonight’s candle light vigil at the local college, I haven’t seen the impact change life in the street. It’s wait and see here…

I myself have little to say on the events. I’ve been nervous, knowing I’m responsible for a number of people traveling throughout the country, but more than anything I’ve had a deep sadness.

I’ve also felt a strange desire to pray not only for the situation, the victims and families and the greater repercussions of these acts, but also for the militants themselves. It’s a profoundly disturbing moment when a young man loses his soul. All I can do is ask for a miracle to return hope, truth and love to that void of despair.

I ask you, please keep India in your prayers.