Calum left yesterday to teach at another Idex camp in Himachal. I’m excited for him (and it’ll be a lot cooler up in the mountains-the jammy dodger) but it does shift things quite a bit for me. Obviously socially it changes things as I live and work with him and he’s become a good friend so I’ll miss having someone to pull silly faces with over breakfast. It then also means the reins are in my hands in terms of teaching/organising it all etc. But it also shifts things as I was almost instantly dependent on Calum when I landed up as he had already been here for a month or so and I got used to doing things with a side-kick. I can be stubbornly independent at the best of times so frustrating to admit that it feels a bit un-nerving to start doing things on my own-especially as a woman. I’m still getting used to being stared at and having passing comments said to me as I walk down the street-a rickshaw driver even said “you are sexy” when I got out of a rickshaw recently. I just glared at him and stormed off wondering what he thought he would achieve by saying that. It does make me feel a bit un-easy, well more uncertain really, of how to “be” as a woman. It’s strange because I don’t really think about it at home. I just am-and my gender feels irrelevant somehow. I had a coffee with Kabir (really sound local guy Calum introduced me to) and I was chatting to him about it and he told me the “do’s” and “don’ts” and things I should avoid doing which will make me look “available”-like drinking alone in a bar for example. Don’t worry I’m not being a total dingbat and oblivious to everything, walking around in hot pants and crop tops down a dark alley at 3am-I’m just still working out the balance between being overly cautious and guarded and being too blasé and relaxed and therefore putting myself into unnecessarily silly situations. I do feel safe here and a lot of the time people are just staring out of curiosity but it does feel strange when you can feel eyes on you, regardless of what the intentions are. I also feel cautious to generalise after the “you are sexy” rickshaw driver encounter for example, especially when all the men I work and live with never make me feel uneasy or uncomfortable-in fact they’ve all played a massive part in making me feel at home so quickly. Regardless of what city I’m in, there’s good and bad. It’s just harder to spot where you’re in an unfamiliar place. I guess, I just have to have my wits about me without shutting myself off to it all.
I have predictably fallen in love with India though-it’s like yep, I already know I need to come back. I know I’m going to miss bouncing around in a rickshaw taking in the sights of empty billboards full of birds, fading colourful writing on the side of buildings, jewellery shops,people having a shave on the side of the road, rickshaw drivers asleep in their rickshaws, donkeys and carts-I even saw an elephant plodding down Tonk Road the other evening!! But the initial honeymoon “seeing everything through rose-tinted glasses” phase has passed now so, as predicted, the annoyances have set in. I think the main thing is the heat. Even local people I work with are feeling it-it’s getting hotter every day and everyone keeps warning me that “this is nothing”. It is going to get HOT. I think it’s making me ill already though. This week I’ve been sick a few times. Only ever in the middle of the night or early hours of the morning for some reason but being sick is disgusting isn’t it?! I’m a bit soft and always feel a bit panicky when I’m being sick (don’t laugh, Ben!) It’s just un-natural for the contents of your stomach to come out of your mouth!! I can’t complain because everyone’s in the same boat and most people have, or have had, it a LOT worse than me.
But even so when you’re hot, dehydrated, tired and queasy it makes you so much more sensitive to everything else. When I’m ill everything annoys me: mosquito bites and being kept awake at night by the need to scratch and heat induced dreams of crowd surfing at parties, water parks, mazes and airports; my leaking toilet; broken flip-flops; nose-bleeds, power cuts; rickshaw drivers getting lost; the lack of peace and quiet. Oh that’s the other main annoyance after the heat.....
Jaipur is a loud and bustling city with constant beeping, drumming, whistling, screeching-even in the house there’s the TV on full blast, the doorbell ringing, music playing and everyone shouting around the house. There are 3 floors and if anyone wants to talk to anyone they’ll shout from the bottom of the stairs all the way up to the kitchen on the roof- “Umaaaajjjjiiiii!!”-until they get a response. Sometimes I sit on the roof to try and get some quiet and it can be quite peaceful-Umaji may be there singing to herself as she cooks and I can just drift into my book with the breeze and the birds singing in the background.....and then a couple of staff will turn up with music blasting from their phones whilst having a really loud conversation over your head as you read. It actually made me smile writing that though! Whilst it’s annoying when you’re in a crabby mood and want peace-it makes the house feel colourful, alive and warm somehow and it’s just part and parcel of living here. Thankfully though there’s a beautiful pool in a hotel nearby I can go to at the weekends to read and relax which has beautiful gardens with peacocks roaming around...and just peace! It’s heaven to get out of rickshaw and walk through the gates! Silence!
So yes the only major hang ups so far are the heat and the struggle to find silence. But that will feel insignificant when I look back on all this. I can imagine just remembering key things-like rushing through the crowd at the Gangour festival we went to with Carloline and Roma to try and get a better view of the parade. Roma asked a family if we could stand on their roof to get a better view and they warmly invited us in-so we quickly took our sandals off and scuffled up their stairs (catching a glimpse of their lives as we ran through the rooms) all the way up to the roof to catch the camels and elephants moving through this colourful mass of people with a view of Jaipur and mountains in the background. Their son told me riddles as we ate sweets and looked at the crowd. (what sport do you win when you take a step back?.........tug of war). There’s a thousand little moments like that but you’re eyes will turn square if I carry on. Incredible India alright. It’s loud. It's hot. It’s bustling. It’s tasty, colourful and smells amazing (apart from the odd whiff of urine on the streets). It confuses the hell out of me sometimes but I’m enjoying being kept on my toes!
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