اس کا پنجابى نهى هے

I finally got to smack someone, albeit on the arm, and I was mistaken for a Panjabi. Go me.

At first the man at the window of the Ladies Car only wanted to shake my friend's hand, which she politely declined considering that it is a much more significant move in India to touch a woman, even to shake her hand. He kept asking, she kept shaking her head, and finally he just reached through the train window to grab her hand which was currently in her lap. At which point I smacked his arm away and gestured for him to go away. At which point she chimed in with "Jao, jao"--the talking-down-to-you way of telling someone to go away. Thankfully, he left. Not getting harassed was the reason we chose to sit in the Ladies car in the first place, and I subsequently offered to play bodyguard and smack anyone else who came near us.

To be quite honest, however, I've been harboring a strong desire to smack someone, something, for quite some time now. The underlying awareness that many Indian men don't view us as full members of society due to our sex without encountering any actual verbal or physical confrontation has created a pent up frustration ever since I was told that if man tried to touch me I should take off my shoe and smack him. I have yet to get physically harassed myself, but every time my girl friends have gotten felt up, sometimes to a dramatic extent, I want to go smack the guy for taking away their dignity. As this week is yet another holiday, I'm reminded how much I am torn between wanting to go downtown to celebrate, and not wanting to relive my friends' terrible experiences in massive crowds of men.

Even the students on my educated (and therefore more liberal than the average demographic) campus aren't immune, as I realized in one fateful Philosophy of Human Rights class when my fellow male students openly confessed that they thought there might be something to this sexism thing. Travis and Christopher saw me chomping at the bit to open my mouth to say something, but really, what could I say? What well phrased comment from a foreigner would erase 25 years of cultural conditioning? Thus I just fumed, let my wonderful (male!) professor defend my dignity, and felt helpless.

In any case, I've since resigned myself to the fact that I can't go around smacking people to relieve my frustration, and ventured out into town to get some groceries. Walking down the street, I overheard some young guy lean over to his friends and say something like, "Uska panjabi hei..." while staring at me. They all then proceeded to laugh, stop halfway through their sentences when I got closer, and then shoot louder flirtations at me. I, of course, ignored them. But also realized that I know enough Hindi/Urdu to know when I might have been mistaken for a Panjabi. Kids, I may be 4 shades darker than I usually am this time of year, but that doesn't make me Indian.

*edit*
Apologies to Arabic speakers for the ﻻ that made its way into the title. . . that was supposed to be کا , and only a weird idiosyncrasy of the Urdu script made me put the lam-alif in before I realized that it was a lam-alif. Why the Urdu کا feels the need to look so much like ﻻ I have no idea.

Take me to the Juicing room, please, Mr. Wonka.

Today, my skin is purple, because last night I wore a sari.

Tomorrow, I will make the water in my bucket blue from my laundry, read 100 pages of The Washington Connection and Third World Fascism, and run 5.5 miles.

Kudos to Middlebury for becoming white, and to all you who blog the occasion.

"Things Indians LIke"

I had yet another one of those "Moments."

The Moments when you look around you and think, "Holy ___, I'm in India!" and all of a sudden the weight of the distance and the difference hits with full force. A bit like waking from a dream for a minute and then falling right back asleep into it. "Moments" normally include noticing things again; that is, the wide-eyed staring awe that first hit when you got of the plane comes back. Here's to a few wide-eyed Moments.


"Things Indians Like"

1. Exact change. When I get back to the states, I am going to kiss my pennies. I fail to understand how a tiny nuisance in your pocket suddenly becomes a hot commodity, but it's true--I value a Rs 5 coin almost as much as a Rs 500 bill. Why? Rs. 500 is almost useless on the streets. They will laugh at you. They will rip you off. Or just stare at you until you helplessly plead to passersby to make change. Remains a mystery as to why even the bus conductor who obviously has a hoard of change in his bag still wants exact change, but simply put, they just like exact change.

2. Chai. Most of people are aware of this, and spiced Irani chai remains hands down one of my favourite inheritances from Mughal India, besides the architecture.

3. Hacking up loogies. Memories of appalled middle schoolers squealing over some kid who managed to cough up a juicy one abound. Old men, young men, and the girls in my hostel all seem to have a mysterious control over their nasal passages with which to clear them out, and all within completely acceptable social practice. I still jump, however, when someone spits a big one right behind me on the street. The highlight, of course, was for my friend Tess while she slept on the train. On a bottom bunk with her head directly beneath the window, the elderly man across from her decided that the best way to rid his nasal passages was to hack one up, lean over Tess and spit it out her window. Needless to say, she wasn't terribly pleased. . .

4. Acid washed jeans and other 70s and 80s inspired mens wear. While the women remain strictly divided into saris, salwar kameez, or salwar kameez with a full black burqa from head to toe, mens wear comes in all shades of decals, flare-leg, tie dye, Reebok, acid-washed glory.

5. Cardamom.

6. Answering the phone with the question, "Where are you?" Never mind that it actually matters, although my brain normally interprets this question as, "Why on earth are you not here at ____ right now?" The question "Where are you?" is often followed by the question, "Have you taken [breakfast, lunch, dinner] yet?"

Fortunately, It was Paradise*

PARADISE, possibly the best restaurant in Hyderabad/Secunderabad.

Of course, if you name your restaurant Paradise, it had better darn well be amazing. Although I didn't cry at the taste of the mutton or chicken biryani, it did make me a little woozy. From Matt's testimonies of the miracles of this food and its effects on his tear ducts, we all knew we were in for a treat. Biryani is the of Hyderabadi food--rice cooked in spices, either veg, chicken or mutton. Paradise, as we experienced on Wednesday, has some of the best biryani in the city.

We ordered for four people, taking advantage of the spread of Indian cuisine:

One mutton biryani
One chicken biryani
One Saag paneer (my favorite!)
One Malai Kufta (Matt and Rachel's favorite!)
One veg curry...eggplant maybe?
One mutton curry...
About 15 roti/kulcha/naan--that is, bread items

Our waiters kept repeating our orders in disbelief, although they didn't go so far as to ask us, "Are you SURE you can eat this much?"
Gluttonous Americans.

Oh, by the way, we also ordered dessert:
2 Gulab Jamun (pastry balls swimming in honey water)
1 Ice cream with hot peach/apricot preserves

The aftermath...I was going to snap a picture before we desecrated the food, but in awe of it all I forgot.

Matt, without whom we never could have come close to finishing all of those curries. We thus dubbed him our Guru of Gluttony.

Rachel and Harrison in the aftermath:

Happiness and Pain, oh so sweet.

*Nerdish reference to a book by Yahya Yakhlif called Unfortunately, It was Paradise.