only 5 weeks to go!

There isn't much to update you on in the last week. We had a great group day last Friday. I presented the proposal for work in the villages to the group and everyone seemed really keen. We will meet at a university next Friday (Feb 8) where we will be introduced to many important people working with the village governments. On Saturday (Jan 26) we stayed in and watched the Republic Day on TV, which was really long, but interesting and without bomb blasts. The past few days at the DIC were fairly uneventful, except we had our Canadian project supervisor visit, and I did a few dressing changes.
I was going to be going to the Taj Mahal in Agra this coming Saturday and then a wedding on the Sunday, but we were unable to book train tickets to Agra for the whole group on Saturday so now we're going on Sunday and missing the marriage. Hopefully I get to see one before going home!

Mussoorie!

Last week was fairly uneventful at the DIC. On Friday, we had our usual EAD at the SPYM main office in the morning. In the afternoon we had a mock trial for a case involving negligent transmission of HIV that turned out to be really interesting. That night, we left on a night train for a small town in the mountains northeast of Delhi, called Mussoorie, for our mid-project. The train station in Delhi was probably the most disgusting place I’ve ever been in my whole life. It was really crowded with very dirty people, and there were huge rats digging through garbage on the tracks beside us. The train was much better than the station, but we still all had the sense we were being taken to a concentration camp somewhere. The car we were on was called a sleeper, and the seats fold out into benches you can sleep on. I put my wallet, camera, and passport in my sleeping bag while I slept, because there was no way to secure my bag. The train took about 10 hours to reach Dehradun and we took a bus from there to get to the youth hostel just outside of Mussoorie. The drive up was more thrilling than any roller coaster I’ve ever been on, because the bus didn’t seem to slow down at all for 90+ degree turns even though the dropoff was at least a few hundred feet at all times, and the road was barely wide enough to avoid oncoming traffic. At least we were bigger than most vehicles we passed. The hostel was pretty nice, besides the fact it was freezing, and we were the only ones there. On the Saturday morning we spent our time settling in. Then in the afternoon we got back on the bus and headed to Mussoorie to see the town and do a bit of shopping. The town was super-nice. Like Delhi, it had a strong culture, however it was MUCH cleaner. We could only imagine how incredible the view was, since it was really foggy out, and we could barely see 20 feet in front of us. On Sunday we stayed at the hostel doing team-building activities and catching up with each other. Monday we went back to Mussoorie and hiked up a path to a place called Gun Point. There was no fog Monday, and we were able to see snowy mountain tops in the distance (the Himalayas!). We stopped for about a one-hour photo shoot, complete with traditional Indian costumes we rented for 50 cents. Even though I’m sure we all could’ve stayed there all day, we hiked back down, got on the bus for another adrenaline rush, and went to a beautiful waterfall. On the way to the waterfall, we saw lots of monkeys, which always makes me happy. The waterfall took a bit of hiking to get to, but was well worth it. Apparently in the summer lots of people go swimming under the falls, but at that temperature we probably would’ve suffered pretty severe hypothermia. The bus took us back to Dehradun, where we ate at a small hotel restaurant with surprisingly good food. Then we got back on the train and arrived in Delhi early Tuesday morning.
Last Thursday on the way to my volunteer placement, I met a man on the metro who is a National Coordinator for the ministry dealing with village development in the Indian Government. He gave me his business card, and Annu and I went to meet him yesterday. He seems keen on networking with SPYM and sending some or all of us to a tribal village in Madhya Pradesh (a state south of here) to help with some aspect of development (infrastructure, health care, sanitation, exporting goods). It seems really promising, and I’ll talk to the group and SPYM to find out more tomorrow.
As a group, we are also trying to plan a trip to Agra to see the Taj Mahal. As we try to figure out all these plans, I’m starting to count down the weekends until I’m home, which doesn’t seem so far away!

i can't think of a title right now

Last Friday afternoon (Jan 4), the whole group went to a few Mandirs (Hindu Temples) together, which was really nice as we haven’t been able to do much as a group. The architecture here will never cease to amaze me. On Saturday I went to the zoo with Annu, Amrit, and Jenny. It was for the most part like any other zoo I’ve ever been to, except all the plants and birds were different. I expected to see elephants and tigers that would be happier than those in zoos in North America, but I can’t say they looked too different. It was nevertheless a good experience. Monday was a typical day of outreach at the Drop-in Centre. We did a few house visits and spoke with family members of clients at the DIC. At the first house we went to, the wife of our client offered to get chai and disappeared. Within 5 minutes of arriving, there were almost a dozen people (women and children) around Annu, Tekchand ji (the outreach worker), and I, asking questions and telling me I should move to India and get married here. The chai came about 30 minutes later, and I found out that the client’s wife took so long because she had to milk their cow before making the chai. Needless to say, it was very good chai.
Each day, the clients at the DIC receive free food from the Iskcon Temple. So, on Tuesday, we went to the temple to thank the man who is in charge of the ‘Food for Life’ program. We weren’t able to go inside the temple as it was closed at the time we were there, but it was still great to see. The Iskcon Temple is just behind the famous Lotus Temple (aka Bahaí Temple) so we went there right after. Then we left to meet the group at a huge convention center, where we observed a videoconference on trade between India, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Afghanistan, and Nepal. Representatives from each country spoke about their needs and the barriers they face for trade, and how they could motivate their governments to work together to improve the logistical constraints they were facing. It was a really amazing exposure to many concepts I would not normally think about.
Yesterday (Wednesday), Annu and I went to do some outreach work with Tekchand ji in another area of Delhi. I don’t know the name of the colony, but it is apparently the largest (by area) in Asia. It has been around about 25 years, and they had still not yet completed many of the roads in the area. It was obviously not a place where tourists go, because many people seemed very surprised to see me there. When we went in the house of a client, everyone again crowded around me, practicing their English to ask me my name, where I was from, etc. It’s really a bizarre experience for people to be so fascinated with me because I’m a foreigner. Tekchand ji was going to be staying longer, so he had two boys take us to the bus stop where we needed to catch the bus to go home. We followed them through crowded streets and narrow alleys, hoping Tekchand wouldn’t send us with people he couldn’t trust, and they eventually got us out to the main road where the bus stop was. They even got on the bus with us, made sure we got seats, and told the bus driver where we needed to go. That was good service. It took us almost three hours to get home, and we have guests coming for dinner, so we decided to take a leave from our placement today. We leave for our mid-project one week from today, which means we’re almost at the halfway point already!

Happy New Year!

I went to an internet cafe on Wednesday, but it wouldn't let me log in to my blog, so I'm giving a quick update from the SPYM Office now. We got together as a group for Christmas, did a secret santa exchange, and had a pretty good time. Obviously it was nothing like Christmas at home though! On Christmas day we went to a small slum area to facilitate some games with kids there, which was a really different way to do outreach than what I've been used to. Last Friday we went to Lal Kuan, which is where they have the drop-in for MSM ('men who have sex with men,' and they had a dance show for us, which was entertaining to say the least. On the way back from it my wallet was stolen on a bus. I only had the equivalent of about $12.50 in it, and no important cards, so it was a best-case-scenario for being pick-pocketed from, and I'm sure whoever took it was disappointed. Last Saturday, I went to India Gate with Amrit and Jenny. It was my first time venturing out in Delhi independently, and I made it home safe. This week I had a very low key New Years celebration at home - Annu's parents went to sleep and Annu and I just talked until midnight, wished each other a happy new year, and went to sleep. Wednesday was a really good day at our placement, and I took lots of pictures for a change because I realize if I don't start taking pictures soon, I'll regret it when I come home. We did 3 home visits, and saw more people injecting, which always makes the day more interesting. Today was our real EAD and is ending early, so we're going to regroup and make plans for the weekend.
Also, I figured out where to buy and send postcards, so if you want one, email me your address!