Thanks again white privilege.

Thanks again white privilege

In India, Goras (white peckerwood honkey crackers) are often un-heard of in places other than big tourist cities. Dehli, Bombay, Goa and touristy places in the mountains see their fair share of European travers, and are ignored as a mere curiosity or a chance to make some extra cash on upmarked items. Our experience in India however, has been off the beaten track, and for the most part far from these places of touristy delight; Little villages and towns, colonies and the rather established city of Chandigarh. In these places, Goras are few, far-between and a fantastic curiosity. Our attendance often brings the attention of many Indians, usually with it simple requests “click a pick?” the standard phrase uttered when a photograph with us is requested, and this seems to happen over and over and over yet again. Because of colonial holdovers, goras are considered very cool, and it is epically “owesome” if you can talk one into being your facebook friend. And as such, picks clicked are a great bit of social capital.

While coolness is one thing, the weird super respect is another, its disarming to be treated as a prince or princess while wearing sweaty grimy clothes, treated to the only seat in the house and attended to by just about everyone. Frankly, I don’t care for it, I prefer to be thought of no more exhaualted than the next person. After shaking the hand of a garbage picker, I was told that as a member of the lowest possible social standing, it was plausible that he had never had the chance to shake the hand of white person before, and how remarkable this must be to him. For some reason or another this bothered me greatly.

We had found ourselves touring the farms and villages of Punjab, and had happened upon the fort of Bathinder, an 1100 year old cantonment made of stone, that included a ramp for the war elephants. Tourists are permitted to walk the grounds of the fort, take the path of the elephants and pick nick amongst ancient trees planted a zillion years ago. But sensitive archeological areas are out of bounds. When the director spotted two Goras, we were permitted inside chambers of secret stories of the past, including how the first Sultana of Delhi escaped the prison one night 900 years ago, we saw the perfect woodwork of her chamber, and looked upon sites Indians were not permitted to see. I was happy to see them frankly, they were rad. 

Himachal

The north of India is built from 5 states, most of them are smaller and less populated than their southern counterparts, with the exception of Punjab, India’s bread basket. Punjab looked like what I expected it, it’s a mainly flat, isotropic, with some water features, and some trees and shit. This makes the landscape good for farming, and the farms they are a plentiful. They seem to grow cash crops such as rice and wheat, wheat being the staple of the northern Indian diet, along with some cotton and occasionally corn.

We had left the plains to travel to Himachal, named for the Himalayan Mountains that are contained within in for more research and some fun. I had expected to see some of the mountain towns that I have become familiar with in North America; small towns located on meadows, shallow slopes and valleys, with small populations and usually free of water features aside from some lakes. What I found was totally different, and shockingly magical.

I had my nose pressed to the bus window as we navigated the switchback roads with little concrete guards to prevent us from careening off the side with its seemingly impossible angle. There were terraced gardens and farms as far as I could see, with buffalo and human working together happily. The unworkable greenness swallowed up every possible spot, aside from a few gigantic boulders that were to large and to beautiful to remove from the hillside. Towns were in every conceivable place, with houses built tall. They were atop hills, and at the bottom of them, they were on terrific slopes and gentle ones, and were populated by a mix of Tebettian, Indian, and foreign tourist from god knows where. Our first little town was called Manali. It’s a valley station, and mainly populated by tourists come summertime, the tourists are mainly Indian, but with a large contingent of Israeli whom have come to smoke the weed that grows wildy and in wild abundance. The town is made from little narrow streets and walkways and cross back and forth up the mountain, it would seem impossible to get a car up some of these roads, but the Indians seem to manage just fine with a few inches to spare.It’s worth exploring google earth to know exactly what I am talking about…

We stayed at the 7000 foot level, and peered up at mountains that jutted up from the ground in defiance of earthly elevation, mountains that seemed taller than possible. This was truly a magical place, and to describe it is a complete failure, akin to describing how soft a bunny feels, or describing the grandeur of a painting, or the feeling that music gives you. This is a place that must be seen to be believed.

This post to be continued on the morrow.

Hello?

The days we needed a cell phone.

The cost to download a single photo while roaming in India is roughly sixty dollars, or a package can be bought for about five dollars per megabyte, or 100 times the cost in Canada. This makes getting directions or hailing an uber impossible, and trapping us in our hotel by the airport permanently. 

Tired of McPaneer...

But that’s okay, because you just have to get an Indian sim card for one of the many mobile networks here, that way you can uber, check maps, and learn how to say that you need diarrhea medicine in Punhabi.

Our first Indian shopping trip was this simple task; find the “airtel” store, and get a sim card…

Firstly, it was just over 45 degrees that day, and moving about was a curious feeling for two Canadians trying to navigate culture shock. Everyone was kind, understanding, patient and honest with us as they explained that to have a prepaid phone we would need to produce two photos of ourselves and complete a lengthy form wherein we were asked to provide addresses as well as references for us that they would call and verify our existence, as well as copies of our passports and visas. We shrugged and gave our hotel as a references, they called and promptly were told that we didn’t exist… it made life hard. For two “goras” or honkies, hailing a cab is like striking it rich for a driver, they will be happy to quote you a rate no less than 5 times the usual, and it doesn’t help that we just look around hoping for someone to help us.

When we finally got sim cards we were happy that; 1, we were able to Instagram, 2 that we were able to move about freely while actually knowing where we going, and 3 able to speak with other people. It wasn’t easy, but it actually was, because our Indian hosts simply took us to the right store wherein we lied about being different people, submitted photos, and agreed to be called Gagandeep and Somnath. 

In India, the best course of action is often to do just as others have, and throw your bottle in a ditch, or pretend to be called Gagandeep...

This post comes late, more than a month after my arrival in Chandigarh. The capital of the state of Punjab, Chandigarh is also known as the city beautiful, so named after the radiant city movement that came out of the Chicago school of urban planning just about at the same time of the birth of the post-modernist movement. Chandigarh was the first planned city in India, and one of the first in the developing world, it came from necessity, after the 1947 separation of Pakistan, and India needed a replacement for Lahore.

Many if not most cities in the old part of the world feature narrow winding streets, a product of development outside of the automobile era. The buildings are constructed organically, one sharing a wall with a neighbor, each growing from another like a vine following a path of its own making, take for example the Iraqi city of Ur, one of the world’s first.

Chandigarh, however is constructed of “sectors” and produces a perfect grid like pattern of order, that the disordered daily life of rickshaws, street vendors, and drivers must fit themselves into. The fit seems to come easy for the citizens, everything is compartmentalized, even the slum areas are cordoned off. The city however isn’t totally devoid of what Europeans talk about when they mention India, stray cows and dogs, litter, “curious” smells and wild driving. It is however, home for now.