India - Day 1
I was obsessed with India from day one. How could you not be when you haven't even pulled into port yet and the air outside already smells of spice? I watched the sunrise, as always, but I'm sure you're getting sick of that story by now. We were actually slightly delayed getting off the ship because immigration took much longer than usual. It didn't really matter though because I had an FDP first thing and so I wasn't missing out on anything but air-conditioned busses and guided tours with way too many other students. I've had enough FDPs by now to realize that they are nothing but a tragic waste of time. They shuttle us around in these embarrassingly luxurious, air-conditioned busses, while we sit in comfort and look out the window, down at the people living on the streets in squalor. It feels so horribly wrong. Here we are in their country, and we're the ones being pampered, bombarding through their home, and watching them as we pass by like they're merely curious exhibits in a museum. The busses drive us to some significant location, we parade off the bus, some guide leads the group of us around while reciting some rehearsed speech, they give us a couple minutes to explore, then try to round us back up and we are forced to stand around and dawdle while we wait for them to herd in all the stragglers. It's ironic really because on the ship they are always encouraging us to explore, to interact with the locals, and to not just be tourists. And then they force us to go on these FDPs which turn us into the epitome of tourists. That is the portion of India that counted towards class. Now listen to the rest of my story and you will see how messed up this academic system is.
My FDP was supposed to be from 0930 until 1300. We didn't get off the ship until about 1130 but luckily my professor said we could still leave at 1300 if we had plans. So four of us left the tour group, crowded into a little rickshaw, and headed back towards the ship. That is when my India experience really started. Rickshaws have a little seat in the front for the driver, and a seat barely big enough to fit three in the back. There were four of us trying to cram into the little vehicle and so being the smallest, I sat on the edge of the driver's seat. The entire bumpy ride back, he kept trying to hand over the steering to me, asking if I wanted to drive. I kept telling him that no, I didn't want to kill my friends, and he'd smile and bobble his head and ask again five minutes later. That was my first impression and how I will always remember India: escaping that horrible tour and sitting crushed next to the driver in a rickshaw, hanging on for dear life, as we zoomed through the colorful streets of India.
He dropped us back at the ship and I found my two friends there waiting for me. We went to the tourism office to see what there was to do, and were pointed in the direction of an area where we could do some shopping. We found another rickshaw driver, asked him to bring us to the place the tourism office had pointed out, and off we went. About half way there our driver asked us if we would like to go to a store that had lady's garments. Now we had been warned that taxi drivers in India will offer endless places to take you, and really pressure you into going there, because in the end they actually know the guy who works there and are trying to give him your business. They are probably also getting a commission for bringing you there. You have to be very persistent with where you are going and not let him take you anyplace else. But we had no definite plans, and were looking to do some shopping anyway, and so agreed to go to what was likely his friend's shop. The store front had all kinds of lovely, fancy, Indian clothes on display. We were let to a little back room where the walls were covered in shelves, covered completely in neatly folded clothing in every color you could ever imagine. Shopping in an Indian store is an experience that takes a little adjusting to. Nothing is marked with prices, and it is nearly impossible to ask the price of something, because they try to sell you as many things as possible and then negotiate a single bulk price in the end. I had no idea that this was how it worked, and was completely lost with the entire system. The ladies who worked in the store kept pulling out such lovely clothing, and would either put each item in a maybe pile or a discard pile, depending on how I reacted, which was terrible for me because I come from a culture where you never want to offend, and thus pretend to like everything whether you actually do or don't. I quickly realized though that the result of pretending to like everything was a giant pile of clothing that they thought I was going to buy. Then when I stared trying to ask how much everything was, our rickshaw driver, who was with us this entire time, said not to worry, he would haggle everything for us at the end.
We each found a couple items to purchase, and then realized we didn't have enough cash. So our rickshaw driver told the store owners we would be back and drove us around the corner to the ATM. We went inside a little building with a sliding glass door and nothing but an ATM inside and stood around examining it for a minute. The slot that you put your card into was suspiciously different colored, and there was a hole drilled further off in the corner. At that point we just stood around completely lost at what to do. How do we explain to our driver that the ATM he brought us to had been tampered with? He was going to look at us like a bunch of dumb, paranoid Americans. Should we just risk it and notify someone immediately to be ready to cancel our cards? We finally went back outside and did our best to explain the situation to our driver. So he took us, literally right across the street, to another little building, but this one had a guard outside who went inside with each of us individually and wouldn't allow anyone else in. When it was my turn I went in to find a brand new, very high tech ATM that had hardly ever been used, let alone tampered with. Such a relief.
After returning to the store and bargaining our items down to a price that was probably still more than we should have paid, we returned to the rickshaw and our driver asked us, "ok, what is next on the program?" which made us slightly uncomfortable because we hadn't planned on having him drive us around from place to place. The idea we had in our minds was to have him drop us off at a market of some sort where we could walk around and explore a bit. So we asked him to take us to the market and he asked if we meant the spice market. Ok, take us to the spice market. That had to be in the main area of the city, right? So he dropped us off at a little store that was literally called "Spice Market." Not, a series of stores making up a market in the African sense that we had grown accustomed to, but a single store. Oh well, we're in India, and you can't go to India without bringing back spices, right? So we went in and were handed baskets to shop around with. I ended up getting terribly ripped off for two different reasons. FIrst off, I was not used to bargaining in actual stores, only the little outside stands and stalls. Does the same concept apply to actual stores? Or is there a set price? I had no idea and none of the shop keepers seemed to be very fluent in English. Secondly, and this has become a major problem whenever we get off the ship in a new city: the entire city knows a ship full of American students has just arrived, and so they jack the prices way up. Then, many of the students who are either unaware that you can bargain, or simply unwilling to bargain because it is too much of a hassle, pay the first price asked. The shopkeepers then, seeing that we have the money to pay outrageous prices simply refuse to let the next person who comes along pay any less. It has become a terrible mess and I seriously got to the point where I would cringe when someone would ask me excitedly if I was from the ship. In fact I got into the habit of telling everyone that I was just a backpacker, traveling my way through India. So at the spice shop I got absolutely reamed, which was unfortunate, but I learned my lesson. Bargaining occurs everywhere in India, and stay as far away from other Semester at Sea students as possible.
We had meant to have our rickshaw driver leave us there, but he simply refused, asking how we planned to get back later, and so slightly annoyed, we climbed back into the rickshaw and asked him to take us someplace where we could drink chai. The place he brought us was a very nice, westernized lunch restaurant. We got out and stood looking at it for a minute before turning back to our driver and asking him is this was where he would drink chai. "No, this is not where I would drink chai, this is where tourists drink chai. At local place you pay maybe 10 rupees for chai. Here you pay maybe 150, 200." We explained to him then that we didn't want to be tourists, we didn't want to go to anymore stores where the prices where ten times higher, and we wanted to drink chai at a local place where he would drink chai. So we loaded back into the rickshaw and he drove us to a little hole-in-the-wall joint with cement walls painted bright yellow, and dirty white plastic tables and chairs. The Indian who worked there brought out two little tin cups for each of us, one containing chai and the other to use for pouring the chai back and forth to cool it off. You've never tasted such perfect chai. I am a huge fan of chai back home but nothing will ever compare to Indian chai again. It is the perfect balance of sweet and spice, and tastes of pure happiness. Our driver, who had joined us, said he hoped we didn't mind that he ordered a few snacks. What arrived was two little tin plates, one with a banana roast for each of us, and the other with four of some sort of spicy, pepper-filled donut served with coconut chutney. You've never tasted anything so amazing. The banana roast became a favorite of mine during the week. It is a banana coated in some sort of batter and roasted. Every country we have been to has had some version of fried bananas or plantains and they are just perfection. Why does this not exist in the US?
I learned over the course of the week that southern Indian food is completely different from northern Indian food. The food from the north is what we typically experience in Indian restaurants in the US. Southern food is based much more around rice, instead of naan, and more often incorporates seafood. The dishes are altogether entirely different but it would take a book to describe. I also learned that these little hole-in-the-wall places where the locals ate, called "hotels" served the absolute best food to be found in India, and I insisted on eating at them repeatedly. The fancier the place we ate at, the more likely it was to be catering to tourists, and thus the less flavor and spice they added to the food. None of that for me please; I want all the spice there is to offer.
A little torn piece of paper with the number 75 was handed to us and I though maybe it was a ticket so that when we payed at the door the man would know what number we were. No, that 75 was the bill. For four people to drink chai, eat banana roasts, and donuts with chutney costs a mere $1.50. Up until this point we had been paying prices for things similar to what you would pay in the US. The realization hit us just how much they take advantage of tourists, and how much we should really be paying to travel in India. The realization was both terrifying and liberating; terrifying because we were in for a struggle as we encountered people who wanted to charge us tourist prices for being white, and liberating for reasons you can imagine. A few dollars in India can keep you happy for days.
Our rickshaw driver drove us around to a few stores, where we browsed and bargained and still got ripped off because we had no idea how much certain items should cost. But by the time we decided to head back to the ship we were content with the way the day had turned out.
