India in General

There are many interesting sights and sounds in India. Each state and region has different languages, culinary specialties, and religious composition. My first stop once my work period started was Mumbai. We weren't there very long but long enough to get several good photos as we were driving around in the bus to our school visits. It was Krishna's birthday on the Monday we were there, and one of the things they do to celebrate that day is to build human pyramids to try to reach these clay pots strung up high between two posts or trees. Thankfully that day, we had some unexpected free time, so I was able to go to the Gateway to India (as far as I know, this is what Indians call it despite the Wiki entry stating differently) with a couple of the other recruiters, and we had an interesting time in South Mumbai. I'm not used to travelling with white people, and men kept stopping to ask if they could get a picture with the girls. It was a little weird and quite annoying, so we tried to not to stop in one place for any length of time. In any case, we had a good afternoon where we also enjoyed high tea at the Taj Hotel, which overlooks the Arabian Sea and the Gateway to India.

We also learned that the name Bombay actually came from the Portuguese Bom Bahia (meaning Good Bay) and that they had difficulties pronouncing the name Mumbai for some reason. I hadn't realised that the Portuguese had gone that far north. I thought they had really only stayed around Goa. So it was interesting to learn a bit of the history there.

Next up was New Delhi. We had a pretty busy schedule there, so I didn't get to see much other than street scenes, but it was a good visit. We did have another unexpected free period when a school visit got cancelled, so we had time to visit Qutab Minar, one of the oldest structures still standing in Delhi. It's about a century old! On one day, we also went out to Dehradun, which was about a 6-hour train ride from Delhi each way. We went for one fair that only lasted 2 hours, so it was quite a journey that day, but it was interesting. Dehradun is really small, and it's much more crowded and noisy than anything we had seen, so for those who had never been to India before, it was quite an overwhelming experience. The trip goes through a lot of farmland, which I believe was filled with sugar cane plantations from the looks of it. The city itself is in the foothills of the Himalayas, so it started to become a bit hilly as we got close to it.

I remember when I was in Monterrey how much I noted contrast. Big houses next to shacks, the poor next to the rich. Here it seems to be even more exaggerated. I've seen mansions with cows in a field next door, street dwellers passing by monolithic office buildings and palace-like hotels. I wonder what it feels like to know that you not only have less than the next guy but that your less isn't enough for survival.

Yet we learned that all people here can go to school for free; the guide our tour organiser got for us says that those who beg on the streets just don't want to go to school. I'm not sure how much of that is true, especially if they're orphans being controlled by someone who might be threatening them, so I'll have to research that a little more.

I'll put more entries tomorrow. If you have questions about the photo album I'll be posting, you'll just have to wait until all my blog posts are finished!

Punjab and Beyond

It seems that I did manage to rest a bit at the airport in Delhi during my layover, but eventually I became quite chilly due to the combined lack of circulation and excess of air conditioning. So I went to get a coffee to try to warm up a bit. It actually did help, although I think it was more just the walking around that did it because I think I really did need to just get some circulation going.

My flight left a few minutes late but still arrived on time, and it was only a few minutes before my bags came out, and I was out of the airport. Lone females must get accosted more than lone males do, but this guy from the airline kept insisting to try to push my luggage trolley for me, and he even put his hands on handle and tried to push, hoping I would eventually let go. I would not. I just wanted to be left alone, and besides, it's not hard to push a trolley a short distance to where my uncle would be meeting me, and he would help me the rest of the way anyway.

We had a pleasant drive back to Jalandhar, though it was somewhat frightening at times once the sun went down and the toll road ended because the roads changed from brighter roads of 2 lanes per direction to a 2-way, narrow road with little light but whatever the moon could provide. And this is not like Canada where pedestrians and cyclists will have reflectors and headlights, so you don't see them often until right as you're about to hit them, and then you suddenly swerve out of the way to prevent the collision. I told my uncle I would never drive here, and he told me he wouldn't let me drive here either! I'm definitely ok with that.

My uncle and aunt have actually "shifted" (the term they use in India for moving to a new place) to another house that's a little easier for them to get around in and that's a little newer and more modern than where they lived before. The old house was my grandfather's house, which my dad inherited when his father passed away and which he later sold to my uncle. We drove past the house because my uncle wanted me to be able to see the brick with my grandfather's name on it for the last time, Narinjan Singh Shergill, for the last time because the house has been sold and will be demolished in the near future. That is the only house I had known in Jalandhar, and though my memories are somewhat vague, as most of the time I spent there was when I was a child or teenager, it just seems like it isn't the same anymore, and I wish I would have had my camera ready to get a good photo of it in time before we drove off. In any case, I have the name now written in my blog here for the sake of posterity, and it will remain in cyberspace longer than I will remain on earth, I imagine. The house was indeed old and quite cold in the winter while too hot in the summer. Still, much of what few memories I have of my grandparents are there in that house, especially my grandfather, who would take me out in the mornings in my pyjamas to walk with him and get fresh buffalo milk.

Readers, you may also be wondering why my grandfather's last name is Shergill and mine isn't; for whatever reason, my dad shortened it when he immigrated to Canada. Sometimes I wish I was a Shergill just because it's so much less common, but it would be such a pain to go through that now that it's not worth the bother.

I spent a good time in Punjab and in Delhi visiting with my family. I didn't do any sightseeing as I had just been to India last year, and I just wanted to focus on visiting since I had just a week to see everyone and didn't want to waste time doing stuff that wouldn't allow me to spend time with them. The sum of my life has taught me that there is too much unpredictability to guarantee where I will be next year or what I will be doing, so I have to take advantage of every moment while I can, and who knows when I will next return to India.

The Joy of the Commute

After London, I had a 6 hour layover in New Delhi before catching my flight to Amritsar, the location of the closest airport to my dad's hometown of Jalandhar in Punjab. In a way, it felt like a wasted because if the Delhi airport actually had trains running from there as well, I could have caught a train to Jalandhar and been there in the same space of time or even less, but what can you do? Oddly enough, the ticket I bought was the cheapest option, even taking into account the fact that I'm flying home from Pakistan! I decided to at least elevate my legs during my stop in Delhi, since my ankles were so swollen, as I mentioned in my last post.

My seat on the plane this time was pretty bad, second in the middle of 4 seats. Being in the middle any time in a flight isn't great, although I don't mind on short flights. It's just the long-haul ones that are really hard to handle. What made it worse is that the guy to my right took up all the arm space, the guy to my left took up leg space, and the woman in front of me reclined her chair all the way back, so I was pretty cramped most of the trip--and the Virgin Atlantic craft seems to have seats that recline more than I remember in other planes. The staff were not the best either. The flight attendant got distracted after the guy to my left asked for another drink, and she failed to collect my empty tray. I thought she would come back to where she left off, but she didn't, and it took 25 minutes before someone responded to my service call. It's the first time I've flown with Virgin, so it's a very poor first impression.

The main problem with flying to India is that you fly with Indians. They take up a lot of space, as mentioned above, without any thought or consideration of others, and depending on the situation, they can be smelly--refer back to my archived blog, when I get it up and running, about the old Punjabi lady who leaned on me all the way home from India and left her shoes off to reveal her smelly feet in knee-highs. Very unpleasant, especially after 14 hours of it! I didn't have any situation like that this time, at least, and of all things, there was a smell of rosewater in the plane! Of course, this is a generality about Indians; obviously not everyone is like that, but somehow, I always seem to get stuck next to the ones that think they own the plane, and it has always been a frustrating experience. I just hope my flights back to Canada are more pleasant!

Back on the road

I have the privilege of returning to South Asia again for a month, this time to spend 3 weeks in India and 1 in Pakistan. Two of the weeks I'm in India are business, but I decided to spend an additional week to visit with family, especially as I didn't have time to do so last time I travelled to India on business. I like having had the opportunity to see them this time. I was able to visit with additional family before even getting to India, though, as I had an 8 hour layover in London and wanted to head out to see my cousins who live there. I was only able to meet one of them as the other had some immediate tasks to attend to with workers coming to her house and what not, but at least I saw my one cousin and was able to meet his wife for the first time. It would have been great to hop on the tube and head over to her direction, but I spent so long going through customs that by the time I got out, caught a train and then a bus to get to my meeting point with my one cousin, we only really had a couple of hours to visit, so there wasn't enough time to go anywhere else.



(Street scene in London while standing at Earl's Court bus stop)

My flight to London was actually quite pleasant, despite being full. Though seated in the middle section and in the very last row, I at least got an aisle seat, and they also had enough space to recline the chair, so I did do that this time because I knew there was no one behind me I would annoy! I was able to sleep for most of the trip, especially as London flights from Edmonton are always night departures, and by the time I arrived in London, I felt well-rested and ready to hit the light fantastic--in contrast to my arrival in India, by which time my ankles had swollen, and I was exhausted! In any case, one of the funny things I saw on the plane was a guy who was knitting. You normally don't see anyone knitting generally, let alone a male. He looked like he was in his early 20s; he has a skill that most females today don't even have!

I had a great visit with my cousin. We went to this little restaurant somewhere around Notting Hill area, and just had a good visit for the few hours I was there. I had fish and chips, not so much because I was in England but because I wanted to eat something lighter than the rest of the menu could offer, and my cousin at his wife shared something called a pide, which I still can't really figure out what it is. It seemed to be something like a pizza, but I don't know how a pide differs from that.

I took the Heathrow Express from Paddington back to the airport, which was much faster than taking the tube. I didn't see much seating at first, so I asked this one guy if I could sit next to him, but it turned out he didn't speak English, so one of his buddies said I should go ahead and sit down. By the time we sorted that out, some other girl had already squeezed in front of me and sat next to the guy, so I just moved on. When I was getting off at my terminal, they were still on the train, getting off at another terminal obviously, and the guy who could speak English said goodbye to me, and then he waved, saying "From Russia with love." That just made me laugh. If there's one thing I can guarantee when I travel, I will always meet at least one funny person!

Photos from Cache Creek Ranch July 2011

Thankfully, one of my friends and faithful blog followers reminded me that he is not on Facebook, so I will post the link to my photo album. Facebook at least provides a way for photo albums to be shared publicly with people who aren't on Facebook, so hopefully this link will work.

Canadian Sights

As much as I love travelling around the world, I do enjoy staying close to home and enjoying local sights and scenery. One thing I've learned over the years, I'm a Prairie girl through and through. I can enjoy the mountains or a beautiful beach, and I've seen some really exotic things on this planet, but there is nothing I love more than my pastoral, prairie scenes. It's the most impressive for me when the canola fields are in full bloom, their bright yellow blossoms a bright contrast against blue summer skies or when grain fields are golden at harvest time, and their sway in gentle winds is to me as soothing as ocean waves. It's so life-giving, too, knowing how these fields feed us and other people in the world.

When I went out to my aunt's ranch over the Canada Day long weekend, I didn't get to see these things as it's too early in the year yet, but it was still a relaxing drive about 2 hours northeast of where I live. It's Ukrainian country out that way, so you see several Orthodox churches dotting the landscape along the way. I posted a few pictures on Facebook, which I think anyone who follows my blog is on anyway, so I direct you to the photos there.

My other purpose, aside from visiting family, was to go horseback riding at my aunt's place. I started riding before I could walk and would ride every summer when I'd go to my grandparents' farm as a child, but once I wasn't able to spend my whole summers there, combined with my grandparents' aging process not allowing them to break horses anymore, there was a long hiatus where I barely rode. My uncle up north has great horses, but he lives about a 7 hour drive from me, which isn't really convenient to just pop by on a weekend. In any case, it's so great to have my aunt and her horses closer so I can go more often. So far, this has only resulted in my being able to go out once a year in the last 3 years, but it's more than I was doing in the past. I love the smell of saddle leather and of the horses. Riding in and of itself is great fun for me, but it also reminds me of my grandpa a lot because he loved horses so much, and I remember going to horse sales and rodeos with him all the time during those summers when I was little.

I definitely didn't become the horsewoman I sometimes dreamed I might. This became especially apparent through the events of my last ride! It always takes me a bit to get used to the horse I'm on. I usually don't ride the same horse twice when I go, so I just have to figure out what to do with the horse I have, and then once that comfortable relationship is established, it's smooth-going from there on in. I think I felt a little overconfident with that relationship when I let my horse run up a steep hill, not an uncommon thing to do as horses do like to run up as it seems to make it a bit easier for them. I've gone up that hill before without difficulty, but I didn't maintain control of the horse this time and let her go too fast. Before I knew it, it became a slow-motion moment in which one of my feet came out of the stirrup, I lost balance and was trying to figure out how to re-gain control. The horse started getting a bit jumpy, however, and before I knew it, I proceeded to be launched into the air and ended up flat on my back. Thankfully, we were in a grassy field and not on a gravel road, and I was not kicked or stomped on by the horse, so it was a best-case scenario if you're ever going to be bucked off a horse. I woke up really stiff the next day, but by today, I was already able to cycle to the gym and do a light workout there, so my recovery is also not going too slowly. I think I should just concede to the fact that I'm not an expert and don't have sufficient time to become so!

Home

As the traveller, the wayfaring stranger that I am, I do often reflect on "home," what it is and what it means to come there. As readers, you may have wondered yourself, sometimes, where my home is or where I feel most at home. And I think the reason I reflect on the subject so much is because I haven't got a definitive answer for myself!

My original concept of home was a place that was familiar, a structure, be it a house or condo or what have you, a place where you felt safe, and somewhere that's a refuge. I had most of that growing up, all except for the refuge part as family issues often created certain difficulties, but for the most part, I thought the house where I grew up was a good place to be. I knew my way around. I knew my neighbours. And I liked them. The places I hung out and went to school were nearby. And it was indeed familiar as I lived there for 16 years of my life.

That house was sold a year after my parents separated and my brother moved to the US for school. My mom and I moved into a new place, and we had to make that our home. I had hoped it would become home, anyway. I painted a mural on my bedroom wall with the sense that this would be a permanent place to come back to. My mom and I lived there for a few years, seeing me through the majority of my undergraduate and graduate school life. But life changed again, and neither my mom or me was to remain in that place, and shortly after my mom remarried, she moved into a new house. That happened while I was living in Mexico, and while it saddened me in many ways, I had thought I would eventually make a life and a home in Mexico now that I was living on my own with the intention of staying there and never moving back to Canada.

Oh, how life changes. I lasted 2 years in Mexico but was unable to develop any community of stable and reliable friends (I did have good friends, but some were other Canadians that wouldn't be there with me forever, so they were reliable but just not stable to stay there). There were many reasons for this, which are not worth going into, but suffice it to say that what I was hoping to have happen to create the home I wanted--developing that network of friends, meeting and marrying someone and buying a home, having good work/life balance--did not happen, and I returned home to recuperate.

I thought I would only stay here for a couple of years before heading out to another country again or even to another city. But I've stayed in my home city since I returned from Mexico and have gone through a lot of instability here such as the inability to find employment I like well enough to stay at for a long period of time, and this has taken a bit of a financial toll on me, which makes it more difficult to leave again when I think about moving expenses. I think I'm digressing. In any case, during this time, my grandparents' yard was also sold to someone outside the family after Grandpa passed away (at least I think that's the chronology of events, if I remember right), and Grandma remained in the house for some years but eventually had to move into a home as her health deteriorated, and she wasn't able to look after herself anymore. This felt like a pretty big blow the first time this event seemed it would become a reality as the farm felt like the only home I had left in the world. It was the place I spent my childhood summers, a place of fun and where there were so many good memories and where happy memories of childhood seemed to outnumber the sad ones. But now it is gone.

When you see your homes disappear from your life, it's unsettling, literally. I feel unsettled because I feel like there's no real home for me, no place where I have the kinds of deep-rooted memories and the history that I had with these places.

I have also realised over time, as a result of these events, that part of the reason I struggle with this is that I dwell too much on the past, that I dislike change, and that I'm an "out of sight, out of mind" person that needs the visual cues to evoke memories of the past. Maybe that's why it's better I not have these things. Maybe I never would have moved forward. I have now no attachment to a place. Because I rent an apartment now, my memories here seem impermanent, like they don't want to sink into the walls to tell a story later one because they know it's not going to last, so there's no point in trying. (I love my apartment's location, though, as it's a couple of blocks from the house where I grew up, and I feel like the neighbourhood is my home.) I realised that this instability has made me thankful, in some ways, of being forced to have no attachment to a place and of having other things I have no attachment to, like traditions, because we didn't really have many of them growing up anyway. And so as it seemed like my whole life fell apart, I came to the understanding that all I really want is stability, something that doesn't change, or something that I can rely on. That's what my home will be. It might be a place. It might be a relationship. It might even be my faith. It will be a space that provides me with rest, to fully be myself without fear of judgment, a refuge from the world when it seems like it's raging against you.

What's home to you? I haven't found it yet, though I do enjoy my quiet solitude in my apartment sometimes, and I can only presume that my definition may once again change as life goes on, and I get a little older, and hopefully a little wiser.