Phene's at Sea 2011

Mar 9, 2011 One of the first things to be noticed about India is the traffic. On every street there is a mash up of pedestrians, bicycles, bicycle rickshaws, auto-rickshaws, cars, buses, trucks, and the most interesting- cows. Cows are sacred to the Hindu religion, so no one would dare to hit them or heard them off the road. Traffic just flows around them, or if it has to it stops. You would be hard pressed to find beef in any restaurant in most of India- the descriptions for the restaurants read “Pure Veg” or “Non Veg.” In the non-veg restaurants it’s mostly mutton, chicken, and fish. Being brought up in a home of huge carnivores I thought I would have a problem with this, but I really didn’t. The veg restaurants were actually much better than the questionable meat available on the buffets of the other ones, and I was pretty happy with my newfound love of tofu. Anyway, today was the most interesting mix of tourist attractions possible. We woke up this morning and had breakfast on the bus on the way to a deserted city called Fatehpur Sikri. The legend behind it is that an old Mongol king had the palaces built because of the predictions of a wise man, and upon completion 14 years later it was discovered that there was a lack of water so it was never inhabited. It’s a pretty difficult legend to believe, even being me who believes everything, because come on, it took 14 years to realize there wasn’t enough water there? Anyway it’s beautiful, built almost completely of red sandstone. In one room, you can even see the original paint on the ceiling after 500 years. After we spent some time at the city we went back to pack up and check out of the hotel. We boarded the bus and headed out to the Mother Theresa Ashram. The Mother Theresa Foundation provides many of these homeless shelters/orphanages and they turn no one away. We were told we would be going to an orphanage to play with the children and we did do that, but we also saw so much more that really made me question my budding respect for the Hindu religion. When we arrived we were able to play with the children for about an hour. Most of the babies were sick with what sounded like bronchitis, and many of them were crippled. The sisters just let the crippled children lay altogether on a mat on the floor and we were told not to go play with those ones. Of course, being sensitive Americans, we did go play with them and they were beyond thrilled that we were paying attention to them. While we were there I subjected our guide to a little interrogation session and found out some really interesting things. What I wanted to know was how these children ended up there and what their prospects were for the future. She basically told me that unwedded mothers leave them at the doorstep of the ashram and that they will most likely spend their whole lives there. It is a shame to be adopted because of the caste system in India. The caste system basically breaks people up into 4 classes based on birth. The children at the orphanage are immediately labeled into the 4th class because their lineage is not known, so they became known as untouchables. She told us that sometimes, very rarely, women who cannot have children will adopt them. In that case, though, the woman will go away to a relative’s home for a year and come back with a baby, and no one will know that the baby was adopted. That way, the baby can assume the caste of its mother. It was really difficult leaving the children’s ward- many people were pretty shocked at the things we’d seen and heard and some of the girls in my group were crying. We were told that we were going to see some older children, which we thought meant the street children that lived in the shelter. What we saw was truly the most uncomfortable thing I have ever experienced. First we were herded into a courtyard surrounded by cages- truly they were cages. Outside in the courtyard was a huddled group of women, all ages, who were mentally ill. They sat there staring at us and we stared back at them. The sisters at the ashram told us that they could not live in the world because they were not well. When we asked about the cages, we were told that some of them get locked in their for “their own well being”- meaning that they were dangerous to themselves. There were about 5 women locked up in one cage, about the length of the courtyard, with only tables inside. They were wandering back and forth hitting the bars while we just stood there. Our entire group was uncomfortable but it was clear that the sisters and our guide thought it was completely normal for us to be looking at them like that. We moved on pretty quick because no one wanted to be in the courtyard anymore. From there we went to the men’s ward. Again, another uncomfortable tour. Our huge groups of students paraded through their sleeping ward. Men who were homeless, blind, crippled, or mentally ill sat on their beds smiling and waving at us while we were encouraged not to talk to them. From there we left the ashram, and we began to ask our guide questions about what we had just seen. She explained that Hindus believe in reincarnation, and that your reincarnation is based on your karma from your previous life. I asked if those men and women minded us coming in and just looking at them, and she said that yes, they probably minded, but they must have done something very bad in their past life to end up in those bodies so it didn’t matter how they felt. After we were done asking her questions it was a really quiet bus ride to dinner. I was truly shocked to my core. I thought that the orphanage I visited frequently in Ghana was pretty bad. There, families would give up grown children because they couldn’t afford them. Can you imagine sitting at dinner with your siblings and being told you were going to the orphanage the next day? But India was a completely new tier. The biggest difference, to me, was the attitude. The people who lived there truly had no one who cared for them- even the sisters acted like they were bad people. It is so hard for me to believe that a 2 year old child deserves to be sickly its entire life because of something it did in its past life. It was definitely an eye opening experience and one that I will not forget. When we got to dinner we were all a little more lively because we discovered we were going to Pizza Hut- yes, I wrote that right. We were seated by a hostess and everything! It was delicious, and while we were there our guide had called some of her friends to come and do henna on those of us who wanted it. I got henna on my hand and my foot, which ended up being a bad decision because I didn’t realize that it takes an hour to dry. We left pretty soon after that for the train station and I couldn’t put on my shoe! So yes, I was barefoot in an Indian train station. Probably not the smartest life decision but hey, ya only live once right? The train ride back took about 4 hours because our train kept stopping, and everyone was so emotionally and physically drained (not to mention stuffed to the brim with carbs) that we pretty much passed out when we got back to the Hotel Ashok for our last overnight in Dehli.