Christmas party, India style!

My Christmas party was a fairly tame affair - no one drank beer but me and we ended at 8:30. Still, it was a good time and I enjoyed getting a chance to make some American food for my friends.

My attempt to make mustard.
Here they use mustard seed,
mustard oil, mustard greens...
but no mustard!  Funny, but it's
nearly the opposite for us in the US.

One of the most rockin suits I may have seen, EVER

To be fair, I had heels on

Village surveys

A man and his child and the family's
unfinished home, due to lack of money

This is hysterical. Apparently this is a well that no
longer works. The villagers tied a bunch of
thorny branches to the top of the well
because kids were throwing stones down it.

The driver I hired to take me to the villages
invited me to his home and fed me some
tasty saag and mahki (corn) roti,
a winter tradition in Punjab.

Surveys in Ludhiana's informal housing settlements, aka slums

You might think that spending time in a slum would be a depressing experience.  In part, you'd be right, simply because it's hard not to feel glum when you see people, and especially children. living in often squalid conditions. But the condition of the homes in different slums varies quite a bit. And while some kids seem despondent and a little sickly, others look healthy, clean and happy. I ask a family's income in my surveys, and you can see how it clearly corresponds to the condition of the community, with one exception. I interviewed a father in a slum not pictured here. He was earning a "decent" salary and his son was attending school - as far as I could tell he was one of the few children, if the only one attending school. I would guess his child will move out of that slum when he was old enough. Through casual, and therefore very unscientific, observation I have also noticed how as income rises, so does the rambuctuousness of the children. I see this in the villages and the cities. The two could be totally unrelated, but just wanted to throw that out there in case anyone else has noticed this.

The inside of a home

Slightly better off slum than above pics

How to deal with poverty 101

This course will teach students how to handle emotions that arise when viewing extreme poverty on a day to day basis.  Students will learn practical methods for handling difficult situations. Examples of situations discussed in this course include little children toiling daily in restaurants; children with missing limbs (especially when it's clear the limb was torn from the child's body) entering trains to sweep the floors for small donations; children with painted faces and decorations dangling from their heads "entertaining" you as they approach your car to ask for money; children with brittle hair who haven't been bathed in weeks picking up garbage for meager returns. Students will come away with the skills to choke back tears when all of this is too much to handle and when things seem desperate and hopeless.

I've cracked the code

About two weeks before I left for Rajasthan, I noticed that the cool (sans water heater) showers that I had relished to relieve my skin of the sticky heat of September and October were becoming less and less refreshing. I surveyed a few Indians to ask their opinion. I could buy a type of rod, several said. This rod plugs into the wall and then you stick it in a bucket of water to warm the water. Well, seems quite counterintuitive to stick a metal rod with voltage running through it into a bucket of water. No offense to the ISI, but I don't feel entirely secure in their monitoring abilities to ensure I won't get zapped to an early urn. The other option was to buy a geiser. Not the kind you find in an old folks' home; it's actually a hot water heater. So I did just that, and had it installed shortly after I returned from Rajasthan.  


Oh, what a difference it makes! But still, I was feeling a bit cool in between dumps of the warm water from my little cup, as I'm now taking bucket showers because the water was redirected to dispense from the wall faucet. The air being only in the 50's in the morning, I would shiver through the whole process. Of course, of course! Mrs. Pogemiller from 5th grade science class would not be pleased that I had forgotten the basics of evaporation. First, wash your hair. During this time your body stays dry, and therefore, a bit warmer. You can even remain nearly entirely clothed during this process. After the whole hair thing, only then do you pour the warm water over your body. This way, you are only wet for a few minutes and can quickly finish the job before drying off. 


A rather trivial discovery, but I enjoy uncovering these little tricks that help me adapt to a new place.