From Brahma to Buddha, Fall 2008

It’s another one of those situations: I could give her a rupee bill—I have a pocket full of 10s and 50s—but she’d still be there, begging, tomorrow. I can’t fix her life with a piece of paper.

But I feel horrible brushing them away, refusing eye-contact and pretending they don’t exist until they wander off. So instead, I knelt down and extended my hand for a low five, offering the question “apka naam kya hai?” (what is your name?) …one of my three or four hindi phrases… and then the game turned to “you try to slap my high five and I whip my hands away at the last moment, until you catch me and then I attempt to slap your hands”. This little girl is delighted and absolutely cracking up.

And then all of a sudden I look up and there are maybe 10 or 15 other kids gathered around me, staring curiously and intently and very unsubtley (people gawk at us blatantly here… on the sidewalks, from their mopeds and cars when we’re in the Gypsy, everywhere. It feels so awkward to so stand out). So there are maybe a dozen other kids gazing down at me with blank, wondering faces. And another dozen adults and teenagers, wondering what it is all these kids are looking at. I sort of freaked out at first, unsure how to engage a dozen children, but then I got the whole group of kids and taught them crocodilly-oh-mie, to the tune of Twinkle Twinkle Little Star, which the one girl had been singing as she slapped my hands. I arranged them in a circle, and put their hands on top of each other in the proper order. And then started the game. They caught on quick. And I felt so great, to have involved and affirmed all of their presence all at once.

And I think that’s when I confirmed what I’d been thinking about for the last few weeks: what can I actually do? I can’t fix their lives with a rupee bill. I don’t have things of value to give away. But I can at least validate and affirm them: show them the huge value I see in themselves. I can’t give them all rupees but I can at least affirm their presence, and I’m coming to feel more and more like that connection—that affirmation of interaction and interdependence—is all any of us can really give to each other.

It relates to what I’ve been thinking about education, too: as much as it’s about math and science, it’s about building self-confidence and supporting the child. Even if these kids can’t go to school and have someone to teach them language and music, I can do what I can in a few minutes to promise them they are incredible people and entirely important. And then, at least, there’s that.

I have no idea who all the kids are. Some of them probably went home with their parents to running water or beds. But some of them, definitely, were tucked in under a single blanket on the sidewalk, like I had seen two children lying on the way into the square, next to their parents sprawled across the bed of a rickshaw.

Ever since I saw this one girl collecting plastic bottles on the street at 6 in the morning at Majnu Ka Tilla when we were leaving what I thought was way early to fly to Guwahati, I’ve been thinking a lot about street children. Something involving them is going to be my ISP in Dharamsala in a week and a half, and so spending some time last night definitely strengthened my confidence in being able to engage and interact with them for those 10 days. We’ll see how it goes. I’ll let you know.

Some other things: Mirise and I are intense at spit. Natalie is teaching us an a capella version of the Jackson 5’s “I Want You Back.” Wade and Tim are splitting off to start their own boy band, the Blast Brothers. Check for them on MTV in the near future. To everyone else’s parents, in general: your kids are fantastic. Thanks for birthing and raising them and stuff.

Also, a mental picture from a few days ago (because, quite frankly, I’ll leap at any opportunity to follow in the footsteps of our fearless leader, Justin):

So, in Delhi, Amit has this car. called the Gypsy. Which is like a jeep or some such contraption: the whole back is pretty open, with a bench seat on the left and right. When transport becomes necessitated, we all pile in, facing each other, and ride with the canvas sides rolled up and velcroed around the metal frame.
We speed (safely, don’t worry) along Delhi’s winding parkways, the wind whipping our hair, dodging autorickshaws, pedestrians, and an endless array of bikers and jeeps, and swerving nonchalantly across the lanes. (it’s how they roll).
Amit blasts the radio and his favorite mix CD which we’ve listened to enough times now to start to become familiar with the songs. My absolute new favorite song in the world is this one called “Sochda Hai”. It goes like this: “badabadabadadaDUMdadadadada, doom dum dadadaDUMMMMM.” Except with words—that I don’t know—and a tune, which doesn’t translate via blogpost. It’s from the hit new movie Rock On, which I am dying to see. You can try to iTunes it. Or YouTube. Good luck.
Anyway, it’s spectacular, and I’m thrilled to be here, flying through the night and smelling this interesting blend of smells that I can now decisively tell you is the smell that smells like Delhi, though can’t actually describe beyond that.
The world moves quickly, and I have no idea what the next two months hold in store, but I can sing along to this absolutely epic song as we fly forward into it.

Also, I promised a few days ago that I’d write a post about trek, which I never did. So about trek: it was great. I am immensely proud of my body for doing things I didn’t know or believe it was capable of. Plus, I lived outside, in a tent, for 9 days. And totally survived. I mean, sure, I definitely missed home for a few days, and got what I deemed “comfort-sick” (as in, wishing I just had a bed. Or a shower. Or my stuffed animals. And that things were easier and perfecter and I didn’t have to push myself in this or that way). But in the end, looking back, it’s that pressure that pushed us closer. That inexplicable Garden-State-esque just desire to scream that discovered the legendary game of Spit to Mirise and I. And, sure enough, like everyone said, it’s living out of that comfort, and pushing myself, and testing my limits and poking and prodding me that wound me up doing things I never had before, seeing myself in new ways, and which left me feeling sort of off-kilter upon our return to society. (Though I’m not gonna lie: that first shower was absolutely epicly wonderful.) And I slept like a baby for the next three nights at Kidar guest house. And maybe it’s hindsight and retrospect and distance that allow me to do so, but looking back, I definitely look back on roughing it fondly, and remember the sight of that big yellow tent at the end of every day, which told us that we had made it back to our portable “home,” and reminded us every evening as we arrived, just how far we’d come. (cue that Matchbox Twenty song).

In a way, we are still sort of on trek. It sort of sucks, I’m determining, to not be settled. To not be able ever to reeeally unpack, or have one place, one spot, one familiarity. But at least, in away, we can fall into the pattern of moving around, the rhythm of constant change, and to have at least the consistency of each other.

You should hear us sing A-wimbo-weigh. It’s pretty wonderful. Or Sochda Hai, though it’s definitely not as practiced.

Anyway, right now it’s 11:04. Everyone else is sleeping. We’re on a train. To Amritsar. That’s pretty snazzers.
I’m lying on the middle blue plastic coated fold-out bed in our compartment.
I’m tired. Quite. I’m going to bed.
Sorry, once more, for incoherency in this blog post.
The world is whizzing by out the window. The moon, low on the horizon, is red and dim and only faintly visible through a whole lotta smog.
It smells like India.
Nighty night, y’all.
<3 sandy