Looking Back, Looking Forward

In our first closing session, Rima opened up discussion about how our perceptions of this country have changed from when we first got here. She wanted us to think back to September, when we arrived, which is something I haven’t thought about for a long time. I started thinking about my time in India as a whole, the timeline and the significant experiences that I had.

When I first arrived and we were going to the hotel from the airport, I remember looking out the window into the slight haze created by the nighttime pollution of the colorful Tata trucks and seeing people sleeping, everywhere. On charpoys, on the ground, on the sidewalks, on mats, on the ground. Even at night, the poverty was extremely evident. It was the first time I realized in all of my study of South Asia I had come to idealize life in India, airbrushing over the realities of poverty and struggle.

A few days after we got into India, after being holed up in the hotel for a few days and not leaving, we begged Surjit to let us go out and see a little of the city. So, the whole group of us piled into a small bus and went off into the city right at the time of rush hour. There were people everywhere, on motorcycles, in buses. The traffic was absolutely crazy and everyone everywhere was on the move. As I stared out the window I wondered how I would ever cope in this country at all, let alone handle 8 months in a situation where I would have to negotiate travel on my own.

Looking back at the classroom phase (September-November), I remember it as being a bundle of travel and school and new cultural experiences. In this phase, I still remember being aware of India as a foreign country. I still felt like a foreigner here, partly because everyday I spent time with the other students and we all shared our feelings about what we were seeing and learning.

When I left for Chittor, I was very apprehensive. I was hesitant to leave Jaipur and all that I knew that I was crossing a bridge, from being handled and taken care of by people in Jaipur to being on my own and dealing with living in an environment where I will be the only person who looks like me. I had no idea just how difficult it would be to be the only foreign woman living in Chittor, but I did know that as we drove away from Jaipur I was really beginning my experience in India. And it was true.

My first few days in Chittor were really frightening and overwhelming. I was trying to find my place at a new internship in a foreign country while trying to feel out my co-workers and my host family. My senses were overtaken by all that I was experiencing, and my first few weeks flew by in a rush leaving me excited to return and find answers to all of the things I still didn’t know.

Christine’s and my vacation over winter break was also another step of independence. We were navigating a part of the country that was totally new to us, and I learned a lot about how to be a traveler. All of my other foreign excursions were very much controlled by the adults in charge with the two straight rows of American teenagers behind them. This was the first time that I really discovered what it was like to completely navigate a country by yourself, to talk about India and all that you are experiencing with other foreigners. We met so many people who all were traveling for different reasons who we interacted with for one moment and then parted ways. Like the German guy we shared a rickshaw with in Ernakulam, or the German couple we shared a taxi with to Palolem, the American couple from Seattle who were taking a year out of their lives to travel the world before changing careers. We exchanged info about our lives and travel experiences, but soon afterwards parted ways.

I remember returning to Chittor and staring at the calendar that proclaimed “JANUARY” in huge letters, almost mocking me as I counted the months until “MAY”, when I would go home. It seemed like it would never come. That month, and February, were the hardest. May seemed so far away, it seemed that I would be stuck in Chittor forever and that I would never be home. It was only punctuated with my lack of direction at Prayas and my seemingly aimless purpose in India altogether. There were days, when I would walk up to the office, where I would question why I was in India at all.

Then March came, and suddenly everything seemed easier. Most of the month was spent away from Chittor, which helped since I was on the move. Vacation just breezed by, and before I knew it, it was April. And there were new MSID students at Prayas to keep me company. Sure, I didn’t see them all the time but when I did, it made the time go faster. PLUS now I was the seasoned Prayas expert who could impart her wisdom on the new freshies, which is always fun.

And now, I leave in two days. It is so crazy. In addition to desperately trying to finish all of the work I have left I am also running around Jaipur like a mad woman trying to do all of my errands before the appointed time of departure. It is so hard and complicated to wrap up your life in a foreign country! Part of me feels like it should fit into some sort of neat box, but there is no way you can ever do that with India. Things are complicated even more because in addition to having this incredible experience I need time to recover from, I am graduating in 10 days! So now, in addition to trying to deal with all the feelings, turns, emotions, strains, heartaches, financial issues, and so on that my year abroad has given me, it is now my job to look into the blank abyss of my future and try to figure out how to fill it.

My year abroad has changed my career ambitions numerous times over. When I came here, I fully expected to work at some point in the State Department. I no longer have any desire to work for our government (for various reasons NONE of them being the man who is the President at the moment…that’s a different issue). I went from graduate of sociology, to WI political machine, to lobbyist, to lawyer, to where I am now. A huge question mark. I know what I want to do; I just have no idea how to go about it. I know things I want to help with, but where do you start?

What I do know is that I have found it impossible after seeing women’s issues in India and hearing more about the issues of other countries, that I wouldn’t dedicate at least a portion of my life to improving women’s status in the world. I don’t see how I could do anything else. I have spent 6 months with an NGO here that is fighting for a woman’s right to say no to forced sex with her husband, to be an active participant in deciding when to have children instead of being a victim to unwanted pregnancies and unwanted children. I have heard stories of women who have had such harsh and hard lives, simply because they are not male and are seen as an extension of property. And then there are the other stories; of female genital mutilation in Africa, of women who are kidnapped in Kyrgyzstan and then forced to marry their kidnappers, of women in Kuwait who, just yesterday, had the men in their country decide that they will not amend the constitution to allow women to vote. When you hear of these stories and you think of all that I have been given simply as a woman born in a different country under different circumstances, it is impossible for me to think of doing anything except helping them as much as possible.

Some may see this as a “Western superiority” mindset, but I would disagree. I don’t want to give charity and pity to people to help them, but I want to enable them to help themselves as much as possible. I have seen first hand the generation of educated Indians who see problems in the social structure of their society and are working for the change, and I want to be in on the process somehow. I just need to find what that path is, or where it is, or what it looks like.

This may seem very idealistic, and I am afraid my friends will scoff at the thought. But, I am idealistic. That’s me. My idealistic nature has not disappeared yet, and part of me hopes it never does. Idealism and optimism are linked with me.