Auspiciousness

So where were we...

Friday, Nov. 28 2008. Approximately 32 hours until scheduled departure for long-planned, much-anticipated 4-week trip across North India with co-teachers and friends. Status: exhausted and confused. The Mumbai attacks were still unfolding, I had hardly slept all week, and there was still a classroom to clean, flat to pack up, report cards to finish. And now, the stress of a potentially unsafe journey. To go or not to go? To alter our itinerary? Delay for a few days to see how things progressed? Go on as planned, you only live once?

The phone rang at 7:00 a.m; PiA made the decision for me. No-go. It was a tremendous relief--no choice but to follow orders--and absolutely heartbreaking. Surreal. By 10:00 my friends had discussed, and decided to go. To follow an itinerary I knew by heart; to photograph lands, streets, people I had so looked forward to seeing, and would not. Enough of India. By 11:00 I was stalking unaffordable flights home to Toronto on Kayak . A giant, grey and gloomy NOW WHAT?

12:00, seated at my crew's usual lunch table when a funny thing happened. JL, my yoga teacher here at KIS, joined us. She never eats with us. Hearing the news, she said, "Why don't you just come down with me to Madurai for the yoga TTC (Teacher Training Course)? I'm leaving in the morning."

Instant clarity, instant relief. Yes. YTTC. I want to do that. Want it even more than to go with my friends to Rajasthan, even more than to go home. That is what I've wanted to do for a long time, badly, and not known it.
-Is there room? Will they let me register at such a late date? (Probably. Phew.)
-Is the course too intense? Am I advanced enough? Is this something to enter into without much thought? (Stuff it, don't want to know, I'll do it anyway.)
-Aha, not so fast! How much does it cost? (What?!? Too much. Far, far too much.)
- What's that? An Indian rate? Perhaps also applicable for foreigners living and working (volunteering!) in India?) A glimmer of hope....

JL called the ashram. She was going to work as staff during the TTC, as she's done every December since her own course in 2004. Swamiji said there was room for me. But it was too late to apply for the Indian rate. My only chance was to come to the ashram for the opening ceremony: another Swami, a Sivananda higher-up, would be there for the initiations. He had the authority to grant a scholarship on the spot. But no guarantees.

On Saturday, JL drove her shaky old jeep down the ghat--pause, flat tire--and through steaming, filthy Madurai. I was almost numb with exhaustion when we pulled through the ashram gates in the early afternoon. Lugging bags, sweaty and overdressed for the plains, we walked past a cluster of people chatting on a verandah. "Are you here for the TTC?" one young woman asked brightly. "Uh...not sure yet," I mumbled, hurrying after JL towards reception.

A team of young volunteer staff--brighteyed yogis from all over the world, dressed in yellow kurtas and tees, white trousers--buzzed in and out of recpection. JL explained my situation in more detail. Swamiji asked how long I'd been in India. Only 6 months? Uh-oh. Scholarships were usually only granted to foreigners who'd been in India (i.e., earning Rupees) for years. He said the prospect was dim, but we'd see in the morning.

The next 24 hours are a haze. I remember an intense headache, the heat, sleeping every possible moment, The vague awareness of TTC students arriving, registering, settling into the dorms, meeting each other. Feeling betrayed. Betrayed by a universe I thought had sent along an exceptional, unexpected gift. By the hope that I'd get to do this incredible course. And now prospects were dim, it wouldn't happen.

Sunday morning, wake-up bells rang at 5:30. Morning satsang was a special puja to Ganesha, remover of initial obstacles, to kick off the TTC. After much chanting, we prostrated one by one and made an offering to the Ganesha altar. (I only recall, from this first puja, an intense headache. And resolving to throw myself at Ganesha's feet, if only he might remove this teeny, tiny intital snag of not yet being enrolled in the course). Towards the end, Swamiji announced that everyone was to go to the temple, and wait outside in silence for individual initiations.

Initiations? But I hadn't had the chance yet! To ask. Everyone else was about to be initiated--to get on the bus--and it would pull away, and I wasn't on it. My heart sank; my mind panicked. Give up. It's not going to happen. Call Kody and have someone send a taxi, ASAP. This is too hard already, it hurts too much, before it's even begun, and it won't ever begin. But my physical body, at least, stood up and followed the 67 initiates to the temple.

As an anthropology undergraduate, I studied ritual, initiation rites, communitas. We read, discussed, wrote about how groups bond by going through formalized practices together; how little things like ornamentation, uniforms, order of participation, and of course waiting, uncertainty, liminality, all work to create a sense of transformation and joining together.
I understood these things analytically; had a mild appreciation of what it was like to experience them from various sports-team activities. But that morning--as a phantom observer, not part of the group but wanting to be part, and watching the group while I stood invisible on the periphery--I get the power of ritual, now. Waiting outside the temple, they called people in one by one. Miserably, I sat there, knowing I would not be called, wondering how long I'd have to sit there, to the end, and what then. The newly initiated TTC students emerged at intervals from the temple with bag, books, uniform in one hand; prasad in the other, full tilak on their foreheads. They walked away with purpose, as though they'd been given the next set of instructions. We waited. I plotted my escape, counted the hours until I could turn my back on this thing I couldn't be a part of (an hour more of this. An hour to arrange a ride. 4 hours until a car can get here from Kody...) Finally JL appeared, knelt, whispered: They won't be calling you, so no point sitting here. Go and rest.

I called a friend. She got to work on a taxi. A plan formed. Back to Kody for two days, just to sleep. Then home. Kody-Madurai-Chennai-Toronto. No matter the airfare, no more of this. I packed, got into bed. Might as well sleep for a few hours. Sleep off the piercing headache; stay out of the students' way.

JL shook me awake at 11:00. Let's go, now, she said. We've got to ask him now, he's waiting.
-No, I said. I'm going home. It's not going to happen. I'm so tired, I feel so sick, this isn't right. No.
I'll forever be in JL's debt, for dragging me out of bed, and to the Swami's room, to ask.

He was an imposing man. Tall and broad and stern-faced; of unclear background. European, but with only the hint of an accent to my Canadian ear, and all the ambiguity that comes from spending a long time away. Away in India, in ashrams, in orange robes.
JL and I sat in front of his door; when he emerged, she explained: from Princeton, a volunteer teacher, can't afford full rate, vacation plans ruined by the attacks, really keen yoga student.
Then he turned to me.
-Are you American? (No. Canadian).
-Where in Canada? (Montreal, and Nova Scotia).
-You went to Princeton? (Yes.) On Financial Aid? (Yes. Whoa, who is this guy? He even called it F-Aid. Does he know Princeton?)
-What are your qualifications? (I have a BA. In Anthropology.)
-You're a teacher? (Yes. a volunteer).
He turned away, moved back inside. Paused and looked at me, considering.
-Ok. Just come work for the ashram when you can, someday.
Before I could pick my jaw back up, he was gone, door closed.
JL and I stared at each other in disbelief. Rather, my disbelief. But she was shining. "You see??!" she said, clapping me on the back. "HAVE FAITH."

Swamiji passed us walking back to the dorms. He looked at me, shook his head. His disbelief. "You are a lucky girl." Or maybe his faith. "Lucky, lucky girl. Yooooou'd better make the best of it."

From camel safari to ustrasana in 24 hours

Not going north with friends on the trip we've been planning since August (itinerary, below right). PiA has, reasonably, asked me to wait a week or perhaps two before they can give the go-ahead for North India.

It's sad and frustrating and feels a little like caving to a culture of fear; and a whole lot like a missed opportunity.

Or a gained one. I've got no desire to hang out waiting in Kody, or even on a Goan beach, for two weeks. So off to the ashram we go, for perhaps one of the scariest things I've ever undertaken: four week yoga teacher training.

It's on my list of things to do in life.

It's a hell of a lot cheaper than flying home for a month.

It means I don't have to worry about packing for cold North and hot Kerala...

And it's not for sure, so please cross-fingers that, when a colleague and I show up later today there will be space, they'll let me join at the 11th hour, and will give the Indian rate...

If yes, I likely won't be posting here until January. Merry Christmas and Happy New Year! Be safe, Northbound friends!

Namaste.

Gazing, Grazing

I recently came across an interesting article on white expats in Jakarta and their experience of being, usually for the first time, in the racial minority. It was about the "Othering gaze," about being stared at, about no longer being white-invisible. The typical reaction is to do anything to escape the gaze: sunglasses, ipod, look down/up/blankly ahead/away, avoid gazing crowds. Avoid, distance, create a hermetic seal between self and gazing other.

Here, tourists gaze. Kodaikanal locals are used to the foreigners who have been here with the school since before there was a Kodaikanal town. It's gendered, though--or at least, my reaction is.
The gaze of Indian male tourists is unpleasant and I usually react as described above, occasionally giving a dirty look, occasionally responding with a real hello, depending on my mood. It is easy to imagine they are not only staring at whiteness, but are also objectifying a body; who knows what is truly behind the stare.
I've become a little mischievous with female tourists who stare. Usually, they come in school groups--or at least walk the lake in large, somewhat ordered packs. They REALLY stare, and it has a different quality, it is a gaze at the strange. I am strange. They stare hard, and nudge each other, and whisper, and point. So...I've started matching their stare. For amusement. I will meet their eyes with even deeper intensity; it usually takes a few seconds for the poor girl to realize I am looking right back. Caught. She then looks away, hides her face, smiles sheepishly, even shrieks and ducks, while her friends buzz. I try to smile while staring--as if to say: It's ok, have a look, I know I'm whiter than white, have short hair, am wearing jeans...but why not say hello, or vannakam, while staring?

Yesterday I was having a coffee and doing some marking (Hilltop bakery has finally accepted the fact that I will show up daily and sit for close to an hour); a group of seniors was talking loudly at the next table. Privileged Indian youth, heatedly debating whether to apply to colleges in the UK or the States. One young man was arguing in favour of the States--preferably the midwest--because whenever he walks the streets of Paris or London, he creates a spectacle. In the States, he disappears. Magnified/melted away. A young woman countered that America has no culture, so she will be applying to UK schools instead.

In exactly two weeks, I will be boarding a train in Chennai, bound for Agra...Delhi....Rajasthan...Rishikesh....Varanasi...then back south for two weeks of yoga at the Neyyar Dam ashram and Kerala beaches with Ficklius and our cousin. It goes ever faster.

Pics: someone got into our trash, check out his toupee; mum's package with bestest new thermal top and earrings finally arrived:

Imagined Realities

On the Real India:
Recently, conversation with some friends here has meandered onto the subject of “the Real India.” The somewhat muddled and troubled concept came to my attention well before leaving home. During PiA orientation, a fellow intern made a rather offhand (and unfair!) comment that implied my position was not “real service” and would be an inferior PiA experience because Kodaikanal, and KIS, was not “Real India.”
I will neither waste this space responding to the argument that teaching isn't service, nor will I validate the idea that PiA posts can be compared in any meaningful way, let alone ranked.
However, the question of whether Kody is Real India might be worth pursuing, and you can count on my returning to the topic in the future. Thoughts thus far:
*There is no The Real India (singular). That’s a well-accepted idea. As a political entity, India exists [of course, only to the extent that any state “exists.” Nation-states are imagined, aren’t they?] But everyone knows that politics aside, India is better defined as a hundred nations in one, as the most diverse nation in the world, best characterized as uncharacterizable in its confounding diversity.
*The idea of Real India (or Real Indias) is not just a Westerner’s concept. It has also been implied by comments made by several my new Indian friends. I can’t imagine of what their notion consists. But I can imagine, that as a figment of Western imagination, Real India must be made of: temples, dusty rural poverty, filthy urban slums, a small but incredibly wealthy urban elite, blaring Bollywood music and a rainbow of saris, dusty crusty poverty, squat toilets and cows and eating with one’s fingers, begging poverty, colourful zany Hindu temples, maybe with the odd mosque or church or turban thrown in, Raj remnants, more poverty, elephants, incense and yoga and spice.
*As a figment of Western imagination, Real India is diverse. But this diversity has impermeable outer borders. In other words, people and influences from outside aren’t part of Imagined Real India. (Exception: the Raj is Real India, because it is Real history that has shaped the Real present.) Outside influences are threats to Real India (so what happens when this present becomes history?) A person who imagines such a Real India might think that KIS, founded by American Missionaries and consisting of about 50% non-Indian students and teachers, is not Real India. All the food and water consumed at KIS is imported from Europe at 6-week intervals. And every time the hot water geyser stops working, a plumber flies over from Cleveland to fix it. Best of all, we get paid American salaries in USD. Hah, hah.
*Last weekend I chaperoned the 11th grade trip to Poondi camp. I ran the Zip Line. High Ropes courses on the outdoor education properties of private IB-curriculum schools are not part of Imagined Real India. But the path through the woods leading to the Zip Line was also used by wild bison, water buffalo and wandering cows. Walking back to camp at the end of the day, I slipped and fell on a particularly fresh, slimy green cowpie. It was definitely Real.

On the Real Kody:
Wednesday night, I had dinner at my friend’s cozy little flat on main campus. Over ratatouille and a precious bottle of red wine, then plum cheesecake and black coffee, we wondered at the fortune a similar flat would cost in Boston, Paris, Sydney. But for the occasional blackouts, we could have been in any of those places. Surely not the Imagined Real India. Is our community a bubble, picked up from Somewhere Else and plunked down on this mountain top? It's more complicated than that--too complicated to be able to draw a line between some Real India, and whatever this place is. The world today is more complicated than that. A snapshot of the following day (maybe this is Real Kody?):
After school Thursday, I went to the bank. The bank tends to be a trying errand--crowded, hot, and incredibly confusing. I am used to plastic cards and pins; here, I actually have to fill out a paper slip to deposit or withdraw, then stand in a "line" for the wicket. Eventually to hand over the slip to a man sitting in front a of a giant safe whose door is periodically opened, in full view of the entire bank. While "waiting in line" (i.e., using elbows and a nasty glare to hold my ground), there was a sudden commotion near the bank door. I turned to see a man, holding the door ajar, kicking at something near the ground. A flash of brown; a monkey's retreating tail, the door slammed and bolted shut. About a dozen monkeys were camped on the bank steps, some of the larger ones especially interested in the door handle, others peering through the glass. Any time someone tried to leave, the monkeys would crowd the door, and it was slammed shut again. We were held up (ahem) for 10 minutes, and I was nearly late for staff yoga.
It's not the Ashtanga I know and love and learned in France and Canada (not in India, not Real Yoga?). A different yoga, a breath-ier, slower yoga. It’s not insta-butt-sculpting yoga. Easier on the body, but so much more difficult (more Real?) Taught by an English colleague (less?) When I put the crown of my head on the ground and rise up in headstand, Indian ground supports my weight.
Walking home after yoga, I navigated around zooming motos and cows, past stalls manned by thin, poor, brown Real Indians. Was stared at, whistled at, leered at. By Real Indians. Even in this town. A foreign white giant woman outside invader of Real India. Almost home: just past the Temple (Hindu), then round the corner and up the hill. Thunder overhead and the monsoon nightsky opened—through the pounding rain I could faintly hear the Muslim call to prayer drifting up the hill.
Through the gate. My umbrella is leaking, my sneakers soaked through (Real rain, Real puddles). Laughter, singing, guitar strumming coming from the dorm common room. It is dorm devotions night: as a study break, the boys gather for a led prayer or song or Bible discussion. I pause in the doorway to look in: two dozen teenagers, about half the faces a palette of Indian Browns, the other faces mostly Korean, framed by incredible moussed and blowdried 'dos, every one of them singing about Jesus. Real voices, Real smiles.
Later there’s a knock at the door. “Ma! Ma! Dhobi, ma.” I open and the dhobi hands over a stack of pressed, folded linens, tshirts, and jeans; I hand him 20 rupees (about 50 cents). My clean (slapped and pounded against a rock in a river, a river fed by overflow from mercury-tinged Kody lake, a river fed by monsoon rain that washes the shit and dirt from Kody roads before rushing downhill towards Dhobi Town) clothes smell faintly of smoke; in this wet season clothes are dried on scaffolding set up over eucalyptus fires.
The Dhobi walks off into the dark, wet Indian night. I return to my French marking, but within minutes, the room disappears into blackness. Power’s out again. Outside, the generator thuds into action; through the windows I see some dorm lights flicker on. Mine do not. Sigh. Rotten luck—or maybe not. Papers can be marked in the morning; teeth can be brushed by candlelight; delicious sleep delivered early by deepest darkness and drumming rain.