To be an Indian woman, and poor

Right now I’m in a hotel room in Dholpur, a city in the state of Rajasthan about a 4-hour train ride southeast of Delhi. Rajasthan is popular among tourists because it is home to the palaces of many former kings. The typical tourist circuit for visitors to India is Delhi, Agra (where the Taj Mahal is) and Jaipur, the latter of which is in Rajasthan. Taken together this is known as the Golden Triangle, because the three points vaguely form an equilateral triangle.

The once home of kings is today home to some of the poorest people in India.

Over the past few days I visited some of the villages outside of Dholpur, talking with people my organization works with; families that make $500 U.S. per year, if they are lucky. It has been an incredibly moving experience. It is hard to put into words, partly because it is still fresh in my mind and I have not fully processed my thoughts yet, but there is one thing that keeps pushing to the front of my mind: Indian women.

I have been no less than shocked to learn some of the numbers and phrases that make up Indian women’s lives. 78. This is the percentage of married women in India who need permission from their husband in order to go visit a family member. This number rises to 89 if the woman is going to stay overnight, which is common and considered respectful, especially during festivals.

93. This is the number of women in India for every 100 men. If nature were allowed to run its course, there would be 103-105 women for every 100 men (because women outlive men). What the number 93 means is that girl infants are killed at birth because the family does not want them and would rather try again for a boy. It means that women who have had boy children begin practicing contraception, because they have already had the baby/ies they, and society, most want.

It means wife burnings, where husbands set their wives on fire, killing them for the most mind-bendingly small and subjective of infractions, such as cooking dinner poorly. Wife burnings are often disguised as accidents and some say that for every wife burning reported, 250 go unreported. There are also dowry deaths, bride burnings and widow burnings, with the ultimate result in each case being the death of a woman.

While it is shocking that women are killed frequently enough for there to be common phrases for their murders, most women do not face such grave circumstances. Most women do, however, believe that it is OK for a man to beat his wife. That is, across all of India, looking at everyone from women from economically-advantaged, urban, high-caste, college-educated backgrounds to women from poor, low-caste, rural backgrounds who have had no schooling at all, most women believe it is OK for a husband to beat his wife. Indian society is publicly debating wife beating right now, in the aftermath of a high level Indian diplomat, Anil Verma, beating his wife until her face bled.

When I first got to India and was reading some of these statistics I was shocked. I knew that India was a strongly patriarchal society, but the numbers breathed shape into that reality. And then I went on this trip and met some of the most marginalized and oppressed women in the country. And it was surreal to meet these women. Because they were so present and so open. Talking about their experiences, sharing their joy over a stranger being interested in them, telling me about the comaraderie and sense of social and emotional support that being part of a self-help group (this is the Indian name for microsavings and lending groups) brought to their lives.

I asked one group of women to share the single biggest change they have experienced as a result of being part of a SHG. One woman, who looked to be about 40 years old, shared this story:

Before the SHG, my husband bought all my clothes for me and the saris that he bought were very thick. When I had to cover my face (women here practice purdah, requiring that they pull their sari over their face when in the presence of a male elder, keeping it covered as long as he remains, which can be seconds or an hour) I could not see. After the SHG, I gained the confidence to go to the market by myself and began doing my own shopping. Now I buy sheer saris and when I have to cover my face I can see.

I was shocked by this woman's story. As she was telling it, my brain slowed down to a putter and I just stared at her, trying to take in what she had said. The idea of her being cut off from the world every day, for decades, and for such a simple reason, was hard to understand.

...

I often ask myself what I am doing here, half a world away from home. I am still so fresh to this culture and it is so different from my own that I frequently feel like a puzzle piece trying to fit into the wrong puzzle.

I am here because it is exciting to discover and navigate a new culture. It makes me feel alive. Just as hearing that woman’s story did. And I am here, and doing the work I am, because being a part of her story, and women like hers’, infuses my life with meaning.

*This was partially written 2 weeks ago, when I was still on this trip, and finished today.

5 Things I Hate

I haven’t written in a while. Partly because I feel a need to be positive here, writing about a country that isn’t my own and is some of my friends’. But I’m a critic at heart. It’s just my natural state. So I’m giving in. If you are Indian or otherwise know Indian culture well, your weigh ins are welcome.

1. Air Pollution: I love the outdoors, but not in New Delhi. This city of some 14 million people has the worst air quality in the world. Seriously, number one. I did some research before I came here and nowhere did I come across this little berry of a fact. But after living here for a couple weeks I decided to look into it and was relieved to find that New Delhi wins the award here. Relieved because I was glad that no place inhabited by humans has worse air quality. I couldn’t imagine it. I often can’t believe that so many people live here and breathe this air every day. I guess, like everything, you get used to it. People are adaptable.

2. Dirt: Instead of grass, parks have beds of sandy dirt. It’s rare to see to grass. It’s rare to see the color green. There are many trees in New Delhi but they are all covered with smog and dirt. In fact, everything is covered with smog and dirt. Colors don’t exist for long in their pure form. Orange quickly becomes Dusty Orange. Green, Sooty Green... Sad.

3. Men Staring at Me: Indian society is very patriarchal. Across India, most married women need permission from their husbands to go to the market or visit friends or relatives (this is fact, from a nationwide government study). It’s uncommon for women to walk around unaccompanied. On any given day, I would estimate that 80% of the people that I see on the street are male. Sometimes I see more feral dogs than women.

Anyway, I like to take walks on my lunch hour. To get out of the office, see some sun, etc. Men constantly stare at me when I do. And stare. And stare. And stare. I read in a guidebook that eye contact from a woman to a man is considered flirtatious, so I have taken the tact of averting my gaze whenever it meets another man’s. But an American friend who has lived here a long time told me that she just stares back, so one day I did too. And I started returning the dirty looks that accompany some of the stares. And, who would have guessed, but it’s actually effective. They look away and often even act mildly ashamed in the process. It’s wonderful. I fantasize about telling people to F$%@ off quite a lot. I wonder what the outcome would be there.

4. Feral Dogs: At first I was afraid of the feral dogs that are everywhere. They sleep during the day and bark and occasionally fight at night. They all look the same too. All birthed by the same mother, I like to imagine. The great wild dog mum – mother to all and none at the same time. The only variations among the dogs are their coloring and whether they are profoundly, as opposed to just slightly, malnourished. After a while I let my guard down with the dogs because they generally do not even seem to take notice of people unless you are someone whose hand is attached to a rock aimed in their direction.

Then one day at lunch when I was going for a walk in the park (see 1, 2, and 3 to get some of the ambience of this situation – 3 because only men sit in parks, and from the looks I get in parks in particular, parks may be the equivalent of a public man cave, so unwelcome am I and my heightened estrogen levels) I saw a dog that had just had pups. I could tell she had just had babies because here teets were full of milk, swaying heavily as she walked. I felt bad for her, wondering if she had been separated from her pups against her will. She didn’t look at me and I turned to exit the park because I had had my fill of stares, dirt and smog. And then she briskly trotted up to me and bit my leg. Really. Just like that. She didn’t break the skin but now I am dangerously afraid of Delhi Dogs. Dangerous because they can smell the fear, right? Now I am a bigger target. Now I cross the street when I see a dog trotting even vaguely towards me. I try not to make eye contact. Who knows what sets those scarred canines off?!

5. Social Hierarchy: I have a maid. He is a 14-year old boy. He works primarily for my landlord and every other day comes upstairs and dusts my apartment. My landlord refers to him only as “the boy”. From what I can tell, he works for her all day. Cleaning, cooking, watering plants, fetching things... He does not go to school. This is not uncommon.

A Letter to Illness

This blog would be incomplete without some of my ditties posted on facebook while in India:

Undear Violent Illness,
You are an unwelcome visitor,
like a neighbor who just can't take the hint.
You show up unannounced
and knock me into the fetal position,
...squeezing my organs with unexpected might.
Projectile, explosive, spasmodic,
You make me want a narcotic.
You are stronger and smarter,
and my efforts to avoid you feel ill-informed.
You make me want my mom.
Don't come round here no more,

Amanda

5 Things I Love

After 1 week in India I feel it is time to espouse some of my loves:

1. Color: It's rather immediately obvious when you see an Indian, particular a women in traditional dress, that color is embraced more fully here than probably anywhere in the world. There's no holding back when it comes to sari color combinations in particular: magenta, deep green and gold; orange and nautical blue; bright red, orange and gold. It's brilliant. Literally. Figuratively. It's not just dress though. Temples, homes, autorickshaws... are all drenched with color. Holli is a holiday dedicated to color. People actually have the day off of work and they go around throwing handfuls of chalky color at each other. Sounds too good to be true, no? It's nothing short of a blessing that I will be here for the holiday in March. I promise pictures.

2. The religious amidst the secular: Temples and mosques of diverse faiths are found in the most unlikely of places. In between a bookstore and a run down home, behind where homeless men sit in front of a fire of garbage to keep warm is a hindu, bahai or jain temple, or a mosque, the outside covered in shiny, blue and green tiles and the inside alight with candles and draped with marigold chains. It's moving, the juxtaposition, but also the prevalence of religious symbology. Overly confident, wealthy businessmen have altars with candles and deities in their stores. I imagine everyone is carrying a personal deity around on their person in one form or another. I like the humility of it too. We all need a super power. Even a businessman who thinks he's better than someone he has more money and power than knows that he can't do it on his own.

3. Warmth of the people: Indians are much more familiar than Americans. It's not uncommon to share a personal moment with a stranger: a glance and a smile implying shared sentiment about an annoying street vendor, or a prolonged, shared laugh between two women when one makes it onto the metro before the doors shut and the other does not. Indians also recognize a much smaller domain of personal space. It's partly a function of geography and population. People are everywhere, and always. When I'm on the metro and my hand or leg brushes up against someone elses they don't quickly and self-consciously move it, like many Americans would. They leave their hand resting on the handhold, and on mine, indefinitely. It's partly to do with the more communal nature of the culture. Which I'm finding I like. It's hard to be lonely in India. It's hard not to connect with others and feel connected. If there is only one thing Americans can learn from communal cultures, it's that we're meant to be together and the pain of not being so is an unnecessary burden we inflict on ourselves.

4. Non-consumption: I work near a "market", which is Indian for shopping center. It's one of the bigger markets in South Delhi and people from miles around come here to do every kind of shopping imaginable: groceries, clothes, electronics, home appliances, even to get lunch and dinner. And yet, when I first saw it, indeed after days of seeing it, I did not register it as anything more than the the main street shopping center of a small town. This is comical to me now that I know that it meets everyone's needs quite well. Everything I've needed I've been able to find on this 2 block strip of tiny storefronts. It's a relief to not see giant retail chains every time I turn a corner (a more common view is dogs trotting and men standing conspiratorially together). It's a relief not to have to worry about buying clothes. I've been wearing the same pants for days and no one seems to care.

5. Tea Servers: For those of you who know me fairly well, you know of my love of tea. On an average day, I have 3-5 cups, sometimes more. Well, on my first day of work I was delighted when in the morning the maid/cook/office help (I'm still not sure what to call him) brought me a cup of black tea with obscene amounts of milk and sugar. And then 2 hours later another. And then 2 hours later another. And then 2 hours later... It was amazing! This is certainly one component of my personal utopia - an endless supply of tea. But the larger beauty is that it's kind of wonderful to be served without asking for something. And I like the assumption that everyone wants tea at regular intervals. It feels so right. I feel so normal. I'm not entirely comfortable with the inequity of the situation but the two men (OK, I admit, it does give me GREAT satisfaction that finally, for once, the "home" help is male, even though it is only because the women aren't allowed to leave the home) don't seem to mind. A job is a job, at least until the world is fair and we all live in a utopia where justice flows down like tea.

Delhi Belly

Despite precautions, I've come down with a stomach bug that's laid me out flat. I've been in bed for the past 18 hours, sleeping most of it, and with no end in sight. I have achy joints, nausea, chills and other symptoms best left to the imagination.

I was in full force sick on my first commute home from work yesterday and it was a terrible experience. The metro was pleasant on the way in in the morning, but in the evening it was profoundly crowded. So crowded, that on the last train, people were pushing each other into the car so tight that I was almost separated from my messenger bag, lost my balance several times and briefly worried I might fall and get trampled. I was worried that I might puke on someone, and then I started hoping I would because people were being so callous (this wicked thought gave me a little pleasure). I started crying. I was the white woman on the train of brown men, being stared at because I was white, a woman and crying. Not my best memory, but it didn't last long. I only had to stay on the train for one stop and I recovered shortly after I got off.

And now I'm in bed, watching a full season of Hot in Cleveland because it was the cheapest thing on itunes and, while it doesn't have much substance, I find it quite soothing. Holla for Betty White.

Traffic, touts and dogs

Here, in goodish, wavering faith, I start a blog to document my time in India. I can't promise my posting will be regular or continual; only that there will be no less than one post. And so we begin...

I landed in Delhi Friday afternoon after a 28 hour flight, the highlight of which is a toss up. It is either the long layover I had in London, where I had time to go to Covent Garden and the British Film Institute (one day I will donate money to this institution because they let me watch a movie in the lobby on my laptop when it was wet outside and I was weary and they had none playing; if you're in London and needing some peace, head here), or having 4 (yes, 4!!!) seats to myself for the overnight Newark to London leg of the trip. I stretched out completely and slept an uninterrupted, peaceful 5 hours. What a gift! It was bliss.

After waiting what seemed like an hour for my baggage, I met the driver who would take me to my hotel. Once we got on the road, things got interesting fast. The traffic was just incredible. I tried to remain cool and act like I see 3 cars driving side-by-side while taking up only 2 traffic lanes all the time, but after I saw a cyclist headed toward us going the wrong way in the middle of a one way, four lane road (you might want to read that again) I dropped the pretense and gasped in horror. As a cyclist and long-time occasional bike commuter, I have spent considerable time thinking about all of the ways that one can hasten their earthly demise on a bike. All of these carefully catalogued human errors, many of which I'm guilty of, were swiftly erased and replaced by this new peerless winner. Will anything ever top this?! What on earth would possess someone to ride in the middle of a highway, against 40 mph traffic?! It is a question for the ages and fodder for the Portland Bicycle Transportation Alliance PR Division.

Eventually we made it to the hotel, which turned out to be in a disheveled and very noisy (even for New Delhi) part of the city. It became clear why my well-appointed room with bath and A/C was only $30 a night. To be totally honest, it was surreal to walk around Paharanj and see the crumbling buildings, piles of garbage in the streets, dogs running unleashed (reminiscent of my last internship on the Yakama Indian Reservation) and conspicuous lack of women (where are the women?!?! What have they done with all the women!?!?!?). I'm embarrassed to say this as someone who is here is to work with people living in poverty, but this is not the world I have known until now. It is very different to see extreme poverty on the T.V., or to read about it, than it is to walk amongst it.

This morning I had my first experience with a tout, con artists known for coming between tourists and their money. But as far as touts go he was an amiable one. Initially, I ignored him because I could tell that he was going to try to convince me to book a travel package or stay at a hotel (where he would get a cut of what I paid), but he was friendly and I didn't feel threatened so I chatted with him as I walked. He gave me advice on how to dress, told me about his western friends and casually mentioned, among other things, a nearby, very helpful tourist office. It was so innocuous that I didn't realize until later that the suggestion was likely self-serving, but I wonder if most conning in India doesn't come with a smile, because few things seem not to. Anyway, if I had to have my first tout, I'm glad it was Raju (if that's really his name).

And now, as I go to bed at 4:30 am local time, it is to the sound of loud dog fights on the streets below. No doubt they're saying: Welcome to India.