Hold On, We're Half Way There

(If my title makes you want to listen to that song, here you go: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lDK9QqIzhwk)

"You can trust no one."

This was one of the first things my incredible housemate, Paulette, told me as she was teaching me to live in India. Logically, this makes perfect sense. (If you've ever been to India, you know this is incredibly important to learn early.) However, despite it being logical, it gets both exhausting and depressing. I just don't really do exhausted or depressed very well. Living for the last six months only being able to form relationships just long enough to create friendship and trust before moving on has been hard... As hard as it can be when put into context of the incredible experience I've been given. It's probably good for me-- it has been a good kick for me to grow up a bit more, become more self reliant and less focused on me (I say while literally writing a blog about myself...) 

However, I've started to notice a trend in my newfound skills-- the Bristol is preparing me for the scary world of online dating.* As a 23 year old, single, soon to be graduate student (yay! that's happening, more details to come), who'd ideally like to eventually marry and have children, this is a very good thing. Half of my siblings found a life partner doing it and .500 is a hell of a batting average. (Ironically, the other half found each other via TFA which I left to take this Fellowship.)

Here's how:

The Bio: I introduce myself to an incredible number of people each day, both via the Internet, and via face to face contact. I have a short spiel that I have perfected and tailored to each country as I go. (Ex. In Taiwan the word "school" should be emphasized, in India the word "government" made everyone much more helpful.) I don't think I'll write a similar spiel when it comes to dating, however, I do think that my ability to communicate information about myself while trying to appeal to a particular audience will be improved.

The Picture: I have some photos of "cool things" I've done in the last few years. However, something tells me photos of me traveling the world probably would make me appear more intriguing than photos of me after being awake for way too long, standing in my art studio, proudly clutching my policy thesis.

Pure Joy

The Questions: For compatibility matches, most websites have you answer a series of questions. In India especially I've gotten my share of answering questions. "Can I have a picture?" (No thank you.) "Why are you so aggressive?" (Sir, you are literally following me down the street yelling at me.) "What country is suffered without your presence?" (America, and points for unique phrasing.) "Are you married?" (Depends who's asking.) "Do you find Indian men beautiful?" (Also depends, unless they are under 3 years of age and then the answer is a resounding yes.)

The First Date: Even in my relatively few years of dating experience I've already had multiple awkward first dates. My best story involves the guy taking me to a salsa dance lesson. Since I was one of the few girls at this lesson (weird, I know) I actually danced with my date for about 10 minutes in the two hours we were there. Ask me about it later, it's a great story. However, it's not one I generally could bring up on a new awkward first date, when we can't think of anything to talk about. Unfortunately, this is basically the only time I think about it. I'll now have tales of my adventures to tell. My date can now enjoy the story of me walking for hours down a sloped median in Australia because I was disgusted by the price of the bus. They can listen as I tell them about being rescued by a Malaysian family on motorbikes after I was kicked off a bus. I can tell them about the bus of Taiwanese college students entertaining themselves for hours singing Chinese karaoke. Finally, I'll recount the trauma and excitement of indian bus travel. Basically, from now on out, my dates, my family and my friends will have to hear me talk about buses. A lot. Luckily, I think these are all good stories so should be entertaining, at least the first time. Thus, for the first date, I'm set. Plus, now I can now maintain a steady conversation with basically anyone regardless of meaningless barriers such as having things in common, language, or interest level.

For Any Future Relationship in General: After 6 months I have a much better sense of who I am. I've identified some things I certainly want to change about myself, but have also nicely identified some things that I'm quite happy about. One of these is the realization I can be fulfilled and happy alone. This is not to say I would enjoy the life of a hermit (except perhaps in India), but I know I don't need someone else to be happy. My siblings are providing me with niecphews at a wonderfully alarming rate, I'd save an incredible amount on college educations, I can still see the world, and I make myself laugh much more frequently than I make anyone else (except for my mother, and for this I am truly grateful.) Many things I thought would be "awkward" or "weird" doing alone, no longer are.

Hmmm... maybe I won't have to suffer through online dating after all. But if I do, I'll be prepared.

All my love from Cape Town.

Indian Snapshots

My first day or two in South Africa all I wanted to do was shower, walk down the street with no one looking at me, see the ocean, go to a grocery store, have fixed prices, and eat a hamburger. What I wasn’t anticipating was the reverse culture shock. I’m honestly a little embarrassed how long it has taken me to readjust.

Some has been positive:

“How marvelous to have this steel box clean my clothes FOR me.”

Or

“Hot water is falling from the sky on command!”

Some has been less so:

“It's how much?”

I was ready to leave India, I was. But, of course there are some things I miss terribly. Animals, sites and people

The happiest looking animals ever everywhere:

Sharing the road with cows:

Cow In Jaipur
(Alana's Photo)

Seeing elephant rides and camel carts:

Stumbling on sites like this:

Royal Gator, Jaipur

Royal Gator, Jaipur

Royal Gator, Jaipur

Views like these:

Amer Fort, Outside Jaipur

Amer Fort, Outside Jaipur

Amer Fort, Outside Jaipur

Red Fort, Agra

Pink City, Jaipur
(Alana's Photo)

View from our hotel's roof, Udaipur
(Alana's Photo)

City of Udaipur

City Palace, Udaipur
Alana

Temple, Udaipur
Alana's

Lake Pichola, Udaipur

Temple, Udaipur
Alana's

Temple, Udaipur

Temple, Bhangarh
(Vijay's Photo)

Local Women Carrying Sticks, Bhangarh

Bhangarh
(Vijay's Photo)

Hawa Mahal, Jaipur

City Palace, Udaipur

Bhangarh
(Vijay's Photo)

But of course, above all I'll miss the people.
My two closest friends I met here:

Paulette and me at Amer Fort

Vijay and me in Bhangarh

And those that came for a visit:

The last visit was especially special--Alana came to see me for the last time we’ll see each other in 2 ½ years. My incredible best friend is off to a small island off the coast of Madagascar for the Peace Corps. I’m so incredibly proud of her.

Every morning I awoke to the sounds of cows, hindi, bells and the vegetable sellers. One of the vegetable sellers sold potatoes and onions. He would shout, "aloo, aloo, alooooooo, pyaaz!" By the end of my stay, as he could come down the street he'd switch shouting, "potato, potato, potatooooo, onion!"

It's weird things like that that I'll probably miss the most. Oh, and the food.

I miss the food.

Wedding Bells

Weddings conjure up images of long white dresses, happy couples, the kiss, and the first dance.

Not so much in India.

I had the pleasure to go to the first and third day of a wedding of my friend’s cousin. I got invited to five weddings in total, and this was by far the closest “relation” I had to any of them. Compared to the rest, I was basically a cousin too.

To prepare, Paulette and I went to the clothing shops to get proper attire. I planned to just wear one of my nice new outfits but Paulette wanted to get all decked out. She finally decided on a lehenga choli (a traditional top, long skirt and wrap.) The next day she picked it up and we went home to get dressed. Vijay (our friend), his sister and their little cousin came to get us. We got there quickly-- (it was right around the corner.) Before we got out of the car Vijay turned to us and casually told us we couldn’t talk to him, couldn’t even know him at the wedding. We were to be his sister’s friend. Paulette asked what our connection to her was suppose to be and Vijay assured us it wouldn’t come up (guess what was one of the most popular questions for all three of us that night.) True to his word, we talked to him once, to be introduced. Since he’s in his late 20s and unmarried it would have created quite the stir if he’d been seen talking to us. These types of “rules” still strike me as bizarre.

The Venue

Weddings are held at large “yards” where there’s an incredible amount of food, and standing around. The first day of the wedding is technically the engagement. It delivered in terms of attired-- a whirlwind of color, and sparkles for the women, and informal attire for the men. I delivered by continuing my status quo of being watched and messing up.

A Terrible Picture Showing the Yard

My first mistake was my attire. My American mindset had me thinking that it would be wrong, almost insulting, if I dressed in a traditional fashion. I knew that dressing in an American fashion would be incorrect as well, so I chose a middle ground. “You don’t like Indian clothing?” was the most frequent English in my direction. A disgruntled look with hand waving and Hindi was considerably more popular.

My biggest mistake though was dancing. Dancing was a catch-22. I’m not a good Indian dancer (shocking, I know.) I now feel the pain of dancers on So You Think You Can Dance. My guest begged (demanded) Paulette and I to dance. I finally relented and so did Paulette. One of the guests enthusiastically started to show us the moves. Paulette (who I should note has lived here for 3 years and was a professional dance teacher) “picked it up” quite well. I did not. In fact I messed up so horribly that my “teacher” smacked me in the arm and then pushed me with both hands off the dance floor. Remember that post where I said living in India is like living in a teenager’s nightmare? There’s the middle school dance.

However, I did shine in one part of Day One—eating. I ate everything with great enthusiasm. The buffet was also the only place I could maintain a conversation, since I can have a toddler’s conversation about food in Hindi. In exchange, I was the only one with waiter service. Once I figured out that I could just be parked in a chair and the men who worked at the wedding would literally come over to me and give me food, my night significantly improved. There were only a few goings-on that had me leave my perch—the bride and pictures.

The bride arrived to a fanfare of drums, dancing and people waving money. She looked like a true Indian bride—absolutely miserable. I should explain. Indian brides are expected to look shy, nervous and frankly, unenthused. The first two were easy to accomplish as she had met and talked to her “fiancée” once, for about five minutes. Given these things, and the fact that she was about to be moved to the home of her parents-in-law, her expression was understandable (and was expected.)

The Bride’s Entrance

Unenthused

She walked through the yard, up to her fiancée and then they stood next to each other, before sitting next to each other. They did not say a word as far as I could tell (and I got a front row seat as I was pushed into as many wedding photos as possible.) They sat there for the better part of an hour and only rose for their first dance. The dance involved her dancing for about 5 minutes with him looking at her, and her looking as if she wished she could melt through the floor.

I also got to meet one of my good friends again. Quite literally the only time I talked to Vijay, the guy who invited us, was when he introduced himself to me for a few minutes. We then had to sneak back into his car for our ride.

Day Three was better in every way. In order to not be fooled twice, I bought a traditional outfit. We went across the street and my lovely neighbor and her daughter pinned and wrapped us up. They even put jewelry on us to make us “full Indian.” Paulette and I “arrived too late” for the dancing. It was perfect. Even the woman who hit me two days before, talked to me and took a picture with me.

The bride and groom spent a majority of time sitting on a stage in ornate chairs, looking passive. Her sari was incredible. It was amazing she could even move given the amount of gold she was wearing. I imagine King Midas was actually an Indian queen, Maharaja Mena. Fun fact—Indian housewives own 11% of the gold in the world.

Around their stage were various items of furniture—a bed, a desk, a few cabinets ect. This was her dowry. Oh yeah, that exists. In fact, I caused an incredible amount of confusion one night when I casually mentioned that I didn’t have a dowry. It’s conversations like that that I never thought I’d have.

Paulette, Vijay and me (in front of the dowry)

The wedding culminated in the bride circling her husband (I somehow missed this part… I was probably at the food, getting great service, as usual) and the exchanging of flower wreaths. The bride and groom stood on this tall tower that rose up and descended. Incredibly loud bells clanged and large confetti cannons exploded. I took pictures and grabbed my favorite shot that I was able to give to the new couple. Quite the “blushing bride.”