A New City

Namaste!!!
Hello from one of the fourteen Americans in town (Lauren). We left Delhi yesterday morning in the wee hours (which wasn’t actually that hard since half us have been waking up at 3am anyways) to get to our new destination. While in Delhi we were extremely busy with meetings, traveling, scavenger hunts, and shopping for clothes. During the scavenger hunt we had tasks like “Find a cricket game and ask to play,” “ride a bicycle rickshaw through old Delhi (SCARY!),” “find the biggest pile of poo” and “try a new piece of fruit.” It was really fun because we got familiar with getting auto rickshaws and going out alone.
Delhi was pretty exhausting- though exciting- and I was excited to head to the next destination so we could enjoy a slower pace. Once we got to our clean and awesome hotel we got to have some orientations with our friends here. It was exciting to hear about their work and the do’s and don’ts of the town.
I don’t actually remember most of yesterday because I was more tired than I ever have been, and fell asleep standing up twice. Apparently, the cure for jet lag is not sleeping till the golden, gorgeous hour of 9pm. To keep ourselves from the temptation of our soft beds we all went to the mall to shop for more kurtas (the long traditional shirt that women wear) and play arcade games. We also shopped for kurtas and cool Indian outfits on Monday in Delhi. We are getting pretty good at bartering!
In one last attempt to keep our rather soccer-oriented team awake, we all went to one of our American friends’ apartment to eat pizza, watch the Paraguay vs. Japan world cup game. I’m pretty sure no one made it through the game without a snooze or two. But, (Praise!) most of us slept awesome after the game was over.
Today was super fun. We ate breakfast in our hotel, which was scrumptious. Our friends joined us for breakfast and we ate things from cereal and waffles to spicy noodles and cheesy potatoes. The guys sported their lovely kurtas, and Josh delighted us all with his new moustache. : D
After breakfast, we met with our friends who gave us a scavenger hunt to do all over town. We had all day to do the hunt, and broke off into teams. I was with Tyler and Mary Elizabeth. One of our highlights was going on the advice of our auto rickshaw driver to some back alley sari shop. We walked around three back alleys, and went down into this little air-conditioned room. M.E. and I debated over colors while Tyler approved and drank chai.
So… one of the tasks on the lists was to ride an elephant. I thought that this was going to be easy, and that there must be some petting zoo that allowed people to take their picture on top of the elephant for 30 seconds and then get off. No such case. Tyler, M.E. and I spent fifteen minutes (and got the advice of about fifteen Indians who didn’t speak English) trying to tell our rickshaw driver we wanted to ride an elephant. I guess he didn’t get my charade worthy impression of me riding an elephant or Tyler saying “pati!” over and over again, because he took us to an elephant temple. We were really in the backwoods of town and were drawing a crowd of people who lived nearby and elephant temple worshipers, but we were determined that we would find the elephant and ride it. Everyone told us that there were no elephants in the town, only at the zoo a far distance away. But finally, one of men in the crowd told us he had the number to the elephant owner and would take us to him.
Tyler, M.E. and I got in the rickshaw, doubtful of our guide, but all of a sudden we were back in a crowded part of town and a huge elephant was on the side of the road. We all piled on the “elephant tray” (what does one call that thing you sit on?) and expected a little walk around the area. But our driver apparently wanted us to show off his elite customers and took us around town for an hour. We were walking in the middle of the streets with bicycles, people, rickshaws, cars and buses weaving in between us. I don’t think I mentioned how crazy traffic is here, but from the perspective of an elephant it is madness. Everyone (thousands of people by the end of the hour) waved at us when we passed by. I felt like a celebrity. We finally told our driver to stop because it had been so long and we were hungry and I had to go to the bathroom. When we got off the elephant a swarm of people surrounded us. A man who had been video recording us (along with a lot of others with cameras) pulled out two microphones and started interviewing us for the news. He asked us what we thought of India and elephants. He also told us that we would never see an Indian doing what we had done because it is illegal to ride the holy elephants and it is illegal to drive an elephant down the street. Whoops! He said that we would be on the 7pm news, but we weren’t- at least not tonight.
Every group has some really great stories and I wish I could share them all, but this post would be even longer than it already is if I did. As far as I know, everyone is having a really great time and there is no need to be worried. We will be starting to do more things starting tomorrow, and I am really excited about it. But we have already done a bit of what we will be doing, and have been able to strike up conversations with people mostly wherever we go. It feels so powerful to be American here, because people will just come up and want to talk to you.
Pr@y that we will continue to stay away from sickness. It has been such a blessing for us to feel reasonably well. Also pr@y for God to put people in our paths who are interested and ready to talk with us. I think this will be harder for the women than for the men, because when the women are out it is usually for a specific purpose like getting groceries, while the men are less reserved and can come over and say hello.
Hopefully now that we are getting more settled and less jet lagged we will be updating more often. Namaste from the place of elephants, spicy food, crazy driving and really hot weather. : )