Understanding India
"It's a jumble." That was how one of our students described India after our first day.
We had arrived at our hotel in an enclave of New Delhi at 2:00 a.m. the night before, after 19 hours of travel--15 students, some of whom have never been outside the Midwestern U.S., and two anxious professors who have never led a group overseas before. We were all jet-lagged, excited, exhausted, and eager, and none of us knew how this class was going to work. But we loaded into a bus after breakfast (and after the best orientation we professors could throw together) and headed out to explore the city. Afterward, we talked.
"There are a thousand contradictions."
"I couldn't believe the poverty. But also the beauty."
"Some of it's so modern. And some feels like it's a thousand years old."
It struck me that they were trying to make sense of the same things that confounded me on my first arrival in India years ago--the same things that astonish me to this day.
The grinding poverty and filth. The stunning beauty. The graciousness and hospitality of the people. The massive social and economic problems. The historical continuity that stretches back not merely centuries, but millenia. (They say the axle width of carts used in rural India today fit wheel ruts unearthed from sites 8,000 years old). The layers and layers of history--Hindu kingdoms giving way to the great Islamic empire of the Moghuls, which would then fall to the British Raj. And then there is modern India, hugely proud of being the largest democracy of the world, a country muscling its way to become a major economic and political player on the world stage, even as it staggers under the crushing weight of a hungry and burgeoning population.
My students had dozens of observations
The brand new Mercedes parked near a row of shanties.
The insane snarl of honking, traffic inching through packed streets.
The ornate Hindu temple nestled between a bank and a coffee shop
The monkeys playing on top a bus as passengers boarded.
The kindness and helpfulness of virtually everyone we met.
The news, full of stories of violence--against women, Muslims, so-called "untouchables."
"How can we make sense of this?" one of my students asked. "How can we even begin to put it all together?"
My answer: We can't. We can observe it, be in it, open up to it. But understand it? After decades of traveling to, studying about, and living in India, I can't say I've even come close to understanding it. Indians don't even understand India. India isn't a place you understand. India is a place you experience.
About Jill
I have spent a lifetime exploring spiritual traditions throughout the world--from Siberia to Afghanistan, Syria to Japan. I have also spent a lifetime writing. In my work, I weave together those two threads, combining the spiritual and the artistic,...
Connections
Causes Jill Jepson Supports
Humane Society of the United States, Defenders of Wildlife, Interational Society for the Protection of Burros and Mustangs, National Wildlife Federation,...
Young People of the West
trying to understand India might benefit from interacting with young Indians trying to make sense of their own country. http://www.youthkiawaaz.com/2012/08/around-cultures-understanding-manner...
... if I may be so bold as to suggest.
I enjoyed reading this post which made me wonder how one might best approach another culture. Through demographics? One thing I remember about India from when I briefly studied about it in sixth or seventh grade was the idea that there were many television stations broadcasting in many different languages. Perhaps this is where Indian English increasingly serves as an efficient lingua franca for communication among people from different Indian states. I grew up trying to understand and absorb Japanese culture, which is a heritage culture through my maternal grandparents, after which I spent many years trying to understand European culture (England and Continental Europe) and I'm just beginning to appreciate the complexity of U.S. culture (e.g. the growing Hispanic population and its diversity, presidential election process, teaching evolution in schools, abortion issue, gun violence, etc.) It seems everywhere people are caught between pervading traditional beliefs and the demands of modernity and/or democracy.
Hi Kim, Thank you for sharing
Hi Kim,
Thank you for sharing the "Voice of Youth" website. Yes, it's certainly true--all cultures seem to be continually wrestling with questions of tradition vs. change.
Understanding India
Jill: I venture to suggest that you and your students do "understand India" as much as anyone born there or living there ever understan their country.
It is, indeed, a land of contrasts. Obvious, blatant, unable to hide or ignore contrasts. If you can see beauty in such contrasts--humanity, with brutality as well as compassion, starvation with oppulence of foods and tastes, village life contrasted with city dwelling, you learn to experience India as you experience life.
Why does the rickshaw wallah smile after a long hard day? Why does the businessman, the banker, scowl?
I love India and have since first encountering it in the hill districts of Darjeeling and Simla and Kalimpong as a toddler. And living in Varanasi, I learned to dislike parts of it--the hard part, the everybody-needs-to-make-a-living part, the scams and schemes people of all strata of society use to make money, to subsist, or to become wealthy.
India is currently undergoing a great change. What the result will be, I and I'm guessing no one really knows. But 300 years of being supressed and administered by a superpower under 65 years of independence as a divided country, a diversity of languages, cultures, spiritual traditions and personal experiences--including the latest "diaspora"--and being essentially the world's second experiment in a federal democracy, with a constitution largely based on that of the first such experiment, the relatively young United States, will result in it.
Glad to see your post and know you're around on Redroom...
Dear Terin, Thanks so much
Dear Terin,
Thanks so much for your insightful comments about India. No matter how much time I spend here or how many times I return, my fascination with it never wanes. It's always good to hear from someone who has also been intrigued and inspired by India.
Jill
Jill: thanks for your kind response
Jill: thanks for your kind response.
Yes, as we (my parents and I) used to always say, you never know how someone is going to be affected by living in India. Either "it gets under your skin" and you feel as if you're a part of it, or you hate it.
I know of two people, anthropologists, of all things, who when they came face-to-face with the country they'd studied for years, were unable to cope with what they saw and experienced as it overwhelmed them--oddly, to me, more than it overwhelmed others who similarly had never been there, but found a way to slip into its waves of life and enjoy being there.
Again, great to find a fellow Bharati-wallah on Redroom.
Best,
Terin
Your post makes me want to go
Your post makes me want to go to India, Jill. I have always had the urge to go to Goa and I don't know why! Very interesting snippet of another world. Thank you for that. m
Contrasts
Hi Jill:
I admit I approached your blog post with some amount of trepidation. Not another Slumdog Millionaire, I thought to myself. And pleasantly surprised was I. You, and the students, while confused took a non-judgemental stand.
As an Indian, having lived all my life in India, the contradictions do bother us. The gap between the poor and the super rich is extreme. But there is the in-between, a vast number of people, who are professionals or skilled workers. They really decide how India lives. This middle-class can, however, be quite cussed when anything or anyone comes in its way.
I have travelled to almost all states and it is the differences that make it so unique. And, yes, the confluence of cultural influences. Unfortunately, those same have come to nag us in an increasingly violent environment where we are happy dividing ourselves.
Yet, as I walk through the streets or ask the drivers to stop the incessant honking, I can only think of this as home. Not all homes are perfect.
Thank you for sharing this, and hope you had an enlightening time.If you are still here and need any help, do let me know. I am in Mumbai, though.
~F
This is fascinating.
As I read your post about India, a place I've never been, I thought about how I keep reading that to thrive and be successful in the modern (and future) world, flexibility and openess to change is vital. It sounds like the best place to practice flexibility and openess to change is India. Perhaps they will teach us all how to prosper in the future.
I did love how your students didn't force any kind of "American" understanding on another culture. That was part of my fascination with your story. Sounds like you and your students took away much to write about!
understanding india
Dear All,
I would add to what jill has said about India...It is very cheap to visit India as you get Rs.50 for 1$. India offers great value for your money, so come and enjoy my India.
India
Thank you for your vivid descriptions. Your post was very evocative.