New Market and the Snake Catcher">New Market and the Snake Catcher" border="0" alt="" />It has been a few days since I last wrote, so my apologies for the absence. It hasn’t been the most interesting few days, but I do feel that I am finding more things to do in a productive capacity (rather than a “filling the days” ort of way). Anisha left on Monday morning, so we lost our Hindi-English translator, and a good friend as well. It has been interesting getting around without someone who speaks the language to rely on. Even though I had done a few little excursions on my own, Anisha was usually present for the big things. It certainly has forced me to focus on my Hindi much more though. I was at Ankeeta’s house last night, and her sister-in-law was trying to invite us over for dinner, ask us our ages and other things, and I was able, with the help of Ankeeta’s few words of English, to actually answer most of the questions! Yay! It was sad to see Anisha off at the train station though…
Anyway, after Anisha left, Casey got us organized to do a couple of things that she had been wanting to do during her time here. Casey had spent several weeks in Bhopal a couple of summers ago, and had been to a centre for the disabled called Arushi, in New Bhopal. So on Tuesday afternoon we went to Arushi to check out the facilities and see if there was anything that we could do. I was struck immediately by how much the facilities could benefit the kids with disabilities that Chingari Trust is trying to get for their kids. I’m hoping that I can get the two organizations to connect and help each other out (or rather Arushi to help Chingari at any rate). Anyway, Arushi has all sorts of things going on, from a recording studio for books on tape, to a physical therapy room for some of the kids with physical disabilities. They were interested in us working on a booklet for them, and asked me if I would like to do a photo project to make posters. It sounds like it would be pretty interesting work, and it would get me out of the clinic for at least a little while, so I’m all for it!
After we went to Arushi, we came back to the clinic for a little while, but ended up going out again shortly to the snake catcher! This guy catches snakes by profession, and Sambhavna has used his services on a couple of occasions when they have found poisonous snakes, like cobras, in the garden. Anyway, we went back to New Bhopal to his “office” where he keeps the snakes that he catches. It was pretty amazing; he had two full-grown cobras, which he let us take amble photos of, and three baby cobras which were no less vicious. He also took out this one giant snake, which he conveyed was quite harmless by putting his face up against the snakes’! Casey and Derek both had a turn holding the snake, but I chickened out and wouldn’t do it. It was just too slimy and gross looking…. Although there was a small part of me that wanted to pet the snake!
Aside from that particular adventure, I haven’t done anything too exciting this week. We went to the Chowk market again yesterday, as it was Casey’s last time and she wanted to get more scarves and some material. I ended up buying some very nice silk scarves that one of our usual vendors had just gotten into stock to give to people back home. We also went to pick up our clothes at the tailors. I had gotten these pants called churidad made, which are a funny shape. They are baggy like clown pants at the top, but are skin tight round the calves and ankles. It turns out that you need to wear at least knee-length courtas (shirts) with these, or else they look quite ridiculous… so that means that I’m going to have to get a couple more shirts made! Although the shirts that she made for me turned out quite well... I’ll have to take some photos.
This morning Casey left for the airport. I decided to go with her and send her off, so it was yet another sad goodbye! I can’t help but be a little bit jealous of the people who are all leaving to go back home. I’m enjoying my time here, but I still miss Dan, as I expect that I will until I’m with him and he’s driving me insane again. I miss a lot of the comforts of home, too. Food that I really want and enjoy, endless Diet Coke, walking the streets at night without worry, wearing clothes that I like and not worrying about them attracting the wrong kind of attention. You know, the little things. However, I’ve already been here for longer than a month, and I feel like I am really just getting settled. I wish so much that I could speak Hindi better so that I could talk to people more. I feel that I’m getting better at communicating with people on a simple level, but the more complex things I still can’t do.
After I came back from dropping Casey off I decided to clean out the girls’ dorm room, which has a plethora of things that past volunteers have left behind. Everything from old shoes, to half-finished bottles of vodka, to expired pills were in the cupboards, so I decided to throw out all the junk. I then thought that this was a good opportunity to move into the two-person dorm room that I am to share with Prabjit when she gets here. So I okayed it with Sathyu, and then spent the rest of the morning washing the thick layer of dust off of the cupboards and re-arranging the furniture. It took me the better part of the day, but I eventually managed to get all of my many belongings into the one cupboard and squirreled away various other places. It’s certainly nice to have a room to myself after sharing with so many other people for all this time. On the other hand, it feels a little bit lonely not to have other people around all the time…
Derek and I ventured to New Market yet again this afternoon so that I could drop off the first rolls of film that the kids took!! The kids came and dropped it off while I was out on Tuesday, and I had to laugh: Sareeta had told me that they would need two weeks to take the photos, and they had only needed three days! Anyway, they’re supposed to come back on Sunday afternoon, so I’ll have to get someone to tell them that I can only develop one roll of film each every week! I’m excited to see how the films turned out though! The computer in the conference room has a scanner, so eventually I’ll have to figure out how to use it properly so that I can put the kids photos up for you to see! By the way, I have received just over $1000 in donations! So thank you to everyone who has sent money!!
Casey and Anisha weren’t able to complete all of the work from their study before they left, so I have been passed on their project. They were working on a study to see if the gas had caused premature menopause. The community heath workers at the clinic are still conducting the study on the control group of people. I’m supposed to help with data entry (or at least as much as I can considering the surveys are written in Hindi, but there is some numeric data I can enter), and also work on the booklet about menopause that the clinic is going to release. Anyway, I’m glad that I am finally getting to do something related to my actual internship. I think that this will be a good opportunity for me to get to talk to the community health workers about future projects as well, so I’m really glad about it.
By the way, I have almost got the photo problem worked out on my computer, although it involves a lot of tedious re-organizing, so you’ll have to excuse the lack of photos on the blog; I know that it’s the best part.
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