Odds and Ends and the Tao of Dung--Goodbye Banaras

Today we say goodbye to Varanasi-Banaras-Kashi and we take off in various groupings for a week of independent travel.  Some will go south to Kerala, others to Rajasthan, two to the Andaman Islands and the rest of us to Darjeeling and Gangtok.  We meet up on November 4^th in Bangalore and begin the last month of the trip exploring the southern part of India. 

Varanasi is the strangest place I’ve ever visited.  It’s dirty, smelly, and loud. It’s also home to some of the friendliest and most generous people I’ve ever met.  The average resident is helpful, interested and fun.  They ask us where we’re from and when we tell them, the always smile and say something like “great country”  or “we like Obama”—seems like everyone knows and likes Obama.  

If one needed a sobering reminder that India has a past we know very little about, this symbol serves the purpose.  Google Aryans and Indian history for a full recounting

I can’t begin to tell you how many people told us how nuts we were to schedule a one-month stay in Varanasi.  Some even asked us why we’d want to come here at all.  I have to admit it made us a bit apprehensive.  I can now tell all those folks that it has turned out to be a stunning success.  As I write in the Nirman library, students are bringing their project papers and reporting that they have loved the city and the experience and they’re going to miss it.  So will we.

I’m constantly amused at the way we’re greeted by various folk in the street.  Here are a few of my favorites, “Hello money.”  “Hello Uncle”  Hello Old Man”  “Hello Baba”  “Hello Gandhiji”  “Hello Grandfather” and my all time favorite from a school kid, “Hello sucker.”

Hello Sucker

I used to like cows.  Growing up we always had at least one milk cow and usually another that we raised for food.  Later in life, my family owned and operated a cattle ranch for several years.  I never thought cows were particularly bright, but I enjoyed their company (some of my friends and family feel the same way about me).  

Here, cows are virtually everywhere.  They roam the streets undeterred and are generally ignored unless they try to eat some vender’s fruits or vegetables.  I understand cows are holy animals, but it bothers both of us when we see them scrounging the city looking for food in garbage piles.  Many residents keep cows for milk and they feed and water them—but for the most part, they’re on their own.  Many of them look sick and weak and not very holy. 

They also produce an endless amount of holy dung.  There are few places you can go where you don’t have to constantly watch out for piles of fresh cow dung.  A great deal of it gets washed into the Ganga.  A great deal of it also gets on the soles of our shoes. 

A few days ago I sidestepped a young bull and hardly gave it a thought until he looked up, made eye contact, and butted me in the butt.  I thought it was funny.  Later, walking home on the opposite side of the same street, I encountered the very same young bull garbage grazing on that side of the street.  I recognized him and he, me, as he again made eye contact.  I gave him a wider berth, but I’ll be a monkey’s uncle, if he didn’t go out of his way to take a swipe at me again.  I’ve thought about this a bit and so I want to be perfectly clear: I don’t like stepping in cow dung and I don’t like the environmental impact of cows on this city, but I’m deeply sorry for all the beef I ate before I stopped eating beef and whoever this bull is, I want him to know that I haven’t neutered a bull for over 30 years and I most certainly will never castrate another bull as long as I live.

I have a special fondness for Goats too

James Brown was known as the “hardest workin’ man” in show business. There are an awful lot of hard working people here, but my vote for hardest workin’ goes to the Richshaw Walas.  I absolutely love these guys.  Times are hard here always, but particularly now with the world-wide recession--another story altogether as the Indian government is touting phenomenal growth rates, while per capita income is down, farmer suicides are up, illiteracy rates are up, child mortality rates are up, India has more malnourished individuals than anywhere but sub-saharan Africa, tourism is down and inflation is up.  So these guys are fighting for every ride and every rupee they can get.

Meanwhile, most people try to get them as cheaply as they can.  “How much to Nirman school?”  “30 rupees” (about 60 cents).  “Thirty rupees, no.  Too much, 20 rupees.”  Usually they agree, but they don’t try too hard to hide the fact that they see you as a bloodsucking jerk.  It reminds me, in a way, of the “reverse auctions” in the Oklahoma dust bowl of the depression.  My father used to remind us of them and why he became a member of the Young Communist League.  A straw boss would gather a group of unemployed men and shout, “I’ve got some land that needs to be cleared.  How many of you will do it for 25 cents?”  As soon as some raised their hands, he’d say, “how many will do it for 15 cents?”  And so on until he got the help he needed for as little as he had to pay.  This, my friends, is the free market place.  The time-honored law of supply and demand.

And so it is with the rickshaw walas. We stopped “negotiating” with them soon after we arrived.  We ask them how much and they’ll tell us the going rate.  We don’t argue and we welcome the ride.  If they actually know where they’re going and can get us there we always try and give a tip if we have change (which, they NEVER have, so we always carry enough 10 rupee notes to cover any conceivable fee).  They sleep on the street, have one set of clothes that they wear until they fall off and sweat and strain to pedal their human cargo from this part of town to that.  They have a most ironic view of things and find humor in just about everything. While we fret about giving money to beggars, we have absolutely no problem in “overpaying” a cycle wala.  I firmly believe if cycle walas ran India, 25% of Indian teachers wouldn’t stay away from their classes each day, garbage workers would actually pick up garbage, and puffy government officials would stop talking about the growth rate and start doing something about the infant death rate.

 I won't write again how wonderful the Nirman staff have been and how hard Nita and Irfana worked to bring everything together and ensure we had the experience we wanted. That would be redundant.

Above: Lunch at Chunar.  Below: Practicing the Hindi Skit at Chunar

Shivam and Ashish above were delighted with my interest in Lord Shiva, especially since one of them is named for him (guess who).  Putul below taught me Hindi words on the bus ride to Chanar.  I learned how to say "I am a mountain goat train".   I find this comes in very helpful in negotiating the price of scarves.  These three are part of a cadre of young people who helped us get around and also served as translators when necessary.  

Nirman hosted a Diwali concert at the Assi Ghat.  The performance was spellbinding.  The performers are PT Ishwarlal Mishra (Tabla), PT Somnath Mardur (vocal Hinustani) and Sri Ashok Jha (Harmoium).

Shanndara works on her project: working with Nirman students on an elaborate and beautiful art project.  She studied the relationship between creativity and students' sense of identity

Durgesh made sure I didn't wander off

Thomas and Leah perform at the party for the home-stay families and the Nirman staff.  They studied under two different Gurus to learn about the Guru-student relationship and the history and cultural role of the Tabla (Thomas) and the Sitar (Leah).  Their performance, after only 3 weeks of instruction was way cool

Above and below at the party

The students studied Hindi in Delhi and here.  They made substantial progress and were able to have "interesting" conversations with the residents.  I asked them to put on a skit using their language skills.  Sara is off camera while pictured here Richie is a cycle wala while Emily and Anna go for a ride, Alex was the rear of the cycle (I think) and Allison (on her knees) was some kind of cow who spoke cow and Hindi. Hmmm.  

Varanasi In Living Color

We arrived in Varanasi on October 2 and are nearly through our stay—in fact we leave next Tuesday.  I wrote earlier that Varanasi is a “Hindu” city.  I could have written that it is also a “Muslim” city as well as a “this” city and a “that” city.  I have committed many errors of categorization so far but this city has brought me a much keener insight into the complexities of this culture and my own tendencies to compare and contrast—far too quickly.  However, I am what I am, and I try desperately to make sense out of things within the mental frameworks I have.  Moreover, I am (after all) supposed to be a teacher and in my area of expertise, I do know a bit about reading texts and various theoretical perspectives from which one can do so.  When asked by a student to comment on “this” or “that” I usually do so from a communication perspective (although my inner Marx sneaks out from time to time) and I really enjoy trading “explanations” with them.

Dr. Nita Kumar and Irfana Majumdar are leading us in our academic pursuits.  The fact that they are mother and daughter is not particularly relevant, but becomes immediately apparent when they—individually or collectively—light up a room with their radiant warmth and drop-dead smiles.  I won’t attempt to capture the depth of the material we’re covering that ranges from Hinduism and Islam, gender and class issues, art, theater and music and, (most importantly from my point of view) to education.  You get some idea of the complexity and depth of our curriculum from the schedule I posted. 

We couldn’t ask for a better tutor in matters of Indian education than Nita Kumar.  She and her late husband formed the school—Nirman or Vidyashram—Southpoint—some years back and have devoted their lives to developing a “post-colonial” model of education.  She has convinced me that absent a radical approach to education reform (and a commitment by the government to support this approach) that India’s education will continue to be driven by values, curricula, administrators and teachers who are simply not providing Indian youth with the kinds of knowledge, skills and mindset they need to move beyond the colonial past with its soul-sucking approach to teaching/learning/organizing/energizing.  I hope to write more about this before and after I return to the states, however, for the time being I’ll simply report that Carol and I have decided that we will work to try and help secure financial support for expanding the work being done here as well as creating more models like Vidyashram—Southpoint once we return and have more time and energy to devote.  We have been discussing working with Nita and Irfana to help draft a strategic plan for the organization and working to set up a 501c3 in the states for the Friends of Nirman. 

Two weekends ago we took a “field trip” to Lucknow.  It became the students’ new “best experience in India” trip and their only complaint was we didn’t spend enough time there.  I encourage you to Google it and learn about the siege of the British Residency during the 1857 “Mutiny” (as the British call it—Indians tend to characterize it as a revolt).  We went to the Residency and toured the museum and adjoining ruins.  We also met with an NGO whose mission is to work or women’s rights and counter sexual violence.  Finally we had a chance to meet Sunil and Nita’s mother and spend a splendid evening in her bungalow.

We have had more than our share of illnesses.  Two students spent more than 3 days in a private hospital with acute gastrointestinal distress.  (I did not post a picture Carol took of a plaque they proudly display with their ISO 9001 certification—an award granted for quality service—and which I can now say categorically is absolutely worthless).  If you truly want to go through the looking glass, spend time in one of these places.  The students came out OK, but I’m not sure I can say the same thing for Carol.  She basically lived there for the entire time dealing with an unimaginably arcane and inefficient system that tested her brilliant organizational and interpersonal skills.  At one time or another, over the past three weeks, every one of the 24 students have had some kind of medical issue but they have forged ahead with their home-stays and projects and classes and field trips, never wavering from their twin objectives of having fun while eating India, problems and all.

In And Around Varanasi

We hobnob with the Maharaji of Banaras.  The kings, princes and rajas were stripped of their positions after Independence and are now figure heads.  He helps with several colleges, leads his districts annual Ramlila and maintains the museum which abuts his residence.

Carol likes elephants.

We visited a village near Betawar--Nirman's rural campus.  After we had a meeting with village leaders, these folks wanted us to know we could take their pictures too.  We got the message and an excellent photo.

A Hindu Temple just yards from our hotel.  One of countless temples in Varanasi

A typical street scene

We live on the fourth floor of the Divya Hotel, just a block from the Assi Ghat.  Our room faces a very busy street and it can be quite chaotic at times.  While Carol was in the room working on a project, she heard a commotion and looked below where a parade was taking place--no one she asked knew what it was all about.  

Nirman and Diwali

Ava joins a class for exercises.  Note how clean things are.

A group of us joined Leah for her birthday at the Aum Restaurant (our favorite eatery).  Clockwise: Ulrika, Ben, TLC, Emily L, Leah, Ava, Thomas, Richie, Shanndara, Kiran, Hannah and Sara

Almost all the female students got henna(ed).  Carol too. 

Our new Diwali Kurtas made quite a fashion statement.  We got different colors to avoid the confusion people have in telling us apart.

Allison, Anna, Alex and Carol before the festivities began

Nita, Irfana and Nandini explaining all the symbolism of the puja

Snuggling with Rosie and Emily N

A whole bunch of beautiful women with their new Sarees

The Ramlila

The Ramlila and Krishnalila are religious street (or River) performances which go on for days and attract hundreds of thousands of participants.  We went on two separate nights to two separate Ramlilas.  Quite amazing

The crowd noise was so loud we could barely hear each other.  Suddenly it grew even louder and the throng started backing into us, causing Carol to fall into me and me to nearly fall to the pavement.  We struggled to get our footing and then looked up and there, no more than 2 feet away, was the cause of all the commotion.  

Children playing gods


Alex and Rosie with David.  David teaches at Columbia and is here at the school to study Indian theatre.  

Richie and Thomas heading off to the event

Lucknow

Outside the Residency museum
One of Lucknow's rulers.  We thought he looked quite postmodern with his pleased look and exposed nipple

Richie and Nita
While in Lucknow, we visited Saajhi Duniya--an NGO which works for women's rights and is especially active in working against violence against women.  Pictured are Roop Rekha Verma and her staff of dedicated workers.  The students were very impressed with their work.

On day two of our Lucknow visit we toured two ImamBaras.  We've seen a number of mosques and Muslim community buildings during our stay--none have impressed me more than these two.

Before heading back to Varanasi on an overnight train, we were hosted by Mrs. Sunita Kumar for a marvelous dinner.  Her bungalow was beautiful but not as lovely as she.  After meeting her we had a pretty good idea of why her son and daughter are such favorites of ours.  Here are Kiran and Sara with Ben and Ava in the background.