This is it people. I am leaving India.   I’m leaving a place I’ve danced and played and lived and loved and despised at times, and place that has rattled me like mad.   I am leaving India and guess how I was sent?   My mom and I packed into a cab at 5:00 am to head to the Cochin airport and the guest house owner came out to help with our bags. It was early in the morning. His wife and daughter were asleep. He had nothing to lose. So, [...]

One of my last nights in Udaipur, having been bedridden all day from post-wedding sickness, I went downstairs for dinner. Pinki was there in the kitchen- she sometimes comes from the village to the main office for meetings. Pinki turns from the sink and asks, “I sleep your room tonight?” Actually it was more like “I sleep your room tonight.” Not exactly a question. I do have an extra bed in my room but it was 9:30pm already and no one had cared to tell me someone was going to [...]

Kaushal and Harshita were introduced 7 years ago when she randomly answered a phone call from an unknown number. After talking over the phone for a number of months Kaushal wanted to meet her. He booked a bus to Udaipur (where she lived) and told her if she didn’t show up to see him he would throw himself in one of Udaipur’s lakes and claim she tried to drown him. Slightly afraid her own reputation would be ruined, but more so due to the fact that she was crushing hard core, she [...]

In a place where I often times feel lost, misunderstood, and confused, there are three things I have found to transcend cultural boundaries: 1. The Meaning of Good. 2. Playing Puppies. 3. High Fives. Let me break it down. The Meaning of Good   We rolled up to the village of Railmagra around lunch time and not 30 minutes into our arrival we found that the planned mural workshop had changed, there was no time for my social justice activities and we would have to get started on the mural [...]

One crisp day in the the melting month of March I walked from my apartment in Stadium Village, to the bus stop where I caught the campus connecter, to St. Paul where I would attend one of many youth studies classes. Plopping down in a chair that was unspokenly mine for the semester, I grabbed my back pack to set it down, only to find that it had been open my entire journey. This wasn’t rare for me to be accidentally unzipped. It actually happens all the time. But, I [...]

A few years ago someone looked me in the eye, sitting at a crammed coffee table in the purple onion and said matter-of-factly, Leah, maybe your purpose is to make people happy.  Staring back at my leadership professor I tried to hide that this statement horrified me a little.  I felt confined by his words. Limited.  All I can do is make people happy?  What worth does that have in the grand scheme of things?  Seemed like a cop out. Nice way of saying, well you can just sit here and [...]

This past week, I had nothing but run-ins with the police.  Miss, you can’t sit on the steps of the train as it is moving.  Even though I see Indians do it all of the time   Miss you can’t rest in front of this shop, you must move. Really? I can’t sit on the steps outside of a Mumbai McDonalds? Don’t try and tell me it is too classy.   Or when Sarah climbed on top of a ledge to take a picture at the Elephanta caves and the [...]

This weekend, despite desires to get out of the city and travel around, I stayed in Jaipur to be with my host family, since I will be leaving them for my internship next week. Oh, by the way… If you haven’t checked out where I will be doing my internship you should:   http://www.jatansansthan.org/   Oh oh! Did I mention that I have two papers due tomorrow? Yeah, I guess I stayed in Jaipur to do those too. Anyway, I was trying to sleep last night but for some reason [...]

It was noon in Bundi. The plan was for Tommy to rent a moped and ride to all day waterfalls all day, while Kirstin, Carli and myself caught a bus home to Jaipur.   Plans changed. Obviously.    How could we hop a smelly bus home knowing that Tommy would be having adventures without us? Inspired at the rental place, we decided it was going to happen. Our day would be spent on a motor bike. No matter what. So… now our plan was for Kirstin to ride with Tommy, and after Carli [...]

Some things you see are confusing Some things you hear are strange But if you ask someone to explain one or two You’ll begin to notice a change in you If you will look carefully Listen carefully That’s a way to keep on growing carefully Look, look, look, and listen. -Mr. Rogers   I once read an article about our willingness to be disturbed. Often times we get an unsettling feeling about something and we want to push it away and hide it. But really what we have to do [...]

Last week was filled with the festival for the God Ganesh. As lucky as can be, my apartment building sits less than a block away from Jaipur’s Ganesh temple, with a balcony and roof that overlook the streets leading to it. Wednesday was holiday, and Tuesday night we went to the temple to beat the crowds. Wednesday we spent the whole day on the roof playing games with extended family and Thursday, India was closed. Everything was closed except my school. Figures.    Anyway… After my classes got out Thursday, [...]

I have been in India for a little over two weeks now. Crazy huh? You know the saying You learn something new everyday? Well, I think I learn 26 new things every day. Give or take 5. Here is how I have changed since moving in with my host family:   One week Leah would try her hardest to resist eating 10 times her body weight in food. She would say bus bus bus (enough enough enough) and pray that Naniji would stop dropping more on her plate.    Two week Leah [...]

I finished the program…ALREADY!!?? Now it’s backpacking time! On April 21st, a majority of people from my program went on a six hour bus ride from Jaipur to Delhi so five girls could catch their flight back to the U.S.  Since me and one other girl who will travel with me, Leigh, had a flight out of Delhi the next day to Kochi, we also went with.   It was a crazy, chaotic single night stay near the New Delhi railway station.  That was plenty of time for me in Delhi, [...]

Huge 3 x 3 sheets of glass (multiple sheets) Ladder (held vertically) Jugs of water (attached like saddle bags) Goats Four people at a time Young children/babies Sleeping young children/babies Women with saris (sitting sideways) Fruits and vegetables (at your feet) A brand new TV in a box (balancing on the handlebars) Boxes stacked 5 at a time (with God knows what)

I am interning with a Non-Governmental Organization by the name of Astha, meaning “faith” inHindi.  The organization is all about the empowerment of women in India.  Astha is made up of 8 different units centered around tribal women, education, culture, women rights, child rights, forest/land rights, and local self-governance.  I am specifically working with the local self-governance unit.  The main goal of this unit is to provide women, especially in the rural and tribal communities, with the assets and confidence to participate successfully in India’s governing system- the PanchayatiRaj.  The [...]