Back from Setrawa!

So hi all once again!

Sorry for taking so long since my last entry (no internet), but I have lots to tell you all. But first I want to show you a picture of all of us together in our nice Indian clothing (it was taken August 15th).

The Wednesday I left for Setrawa, I began to feel a bit sick, which ended up resulting in going back to Jodhpur until my birthday (Friday) but it wasn’t until after I had spent some time in Setrawa. So the organization we are working through, Sambhali Trust works in Setrawa to empower young women through education, and so they have a small mini-school where classes are held for girls (especially Dalit girls, girls of the lower class.) The following picture is from the first day with some of the Stanbford students and locals (I am in the van heading back to Jodhpur.)

But, during this time, the fact it was a really hot day (42C, 107F plus some humidity) got to me as well as general stomach problems from Indian food (very common) and I wasn’t up for doing much. I went back with another person on my trip, and she had suffered from heat stroke, and went to the doctor’s office for an IV, which I did not need. Fortunately, there was a 15 minute period in which I drank 1.5L of water, which probably somewhat saved me.

So for those two nights in Jodhpur I stayed in the FSD (Foundation for Sustainable Development) office as they had a side room with three beds for me the other girl (Evelyn) and the staff member, Erica, who had come back to buy plane tickets to Mumbai (and didn’t end up coming back with us because she got sick.) While we did not have A/C (sadly) there was a ceiling fan and a water cooler, a very common cooling device in Jodhpur in which a fan blows air through water, and somewhat cools down the air. The night temperature was still in the mid 80s, but at least you could feel a bit of a breeze. Unfortunately, we were awoken at 7 am each morning because the power would go off; turning off what was cooling us, and also allowing the sound of traffic outside to be heard. (We were unlucky, apparently the power usually doesn’t go off till 9 am, and stays off until about noon.) Nothing really works, except cell phones, which seem to always be able to work.

I do have to put in a special thank you to Smita(ji), the head of FSD, for her kindness in hosting us at the FSD office, where she stays as well. Thursday morning, she even made us french toast with honey! Nice to have a reminder of food I am more used to eating.

The Thursday I spent in the FSD office, and had good conversation with various FSD interns who have been here most of the summer discussing different aspects of being here. We talked about how we are the biggest benefactors of coming to India, even though we came to help the communities. We also talked about the difficulties of learning/speaking Hindi (and how Indians are not used to hearing people speaking Hindi with an accent, how ironic.) It was definitely interesting to hear about their experiences and what they felt they were able to accomplish, since their time here is basically almost done.

Friday August 14, my birthday (which people reminded me of throughout the day); it was the 1.5-2 hour trip back out to Setrawa again. The trip goes relatively quickly once you get off of Jodhpur because the rural roads have less traffic and are much better paved (in general.) Along the way you see everything from people relieving themselves along the road to Sandstone mines to women walking alongside the road in saris carrying water on their heads. Apparently, the Thar Desert (where I am) is the most densely populated desert in the world (definitely not hard to believe.)

While I was gone, the group had started talking to the locals about different problems that they had, which we continued on Friday. The following is a partial list of the big/more interesting issues:
Lack of good water (there is a drought)
Women not given many opportunities, parents keep them out of high school because they don’t want them mixing with girls (very conservative society)
The way people wash their hands is either/or using the dirty water without soap and with the sand in the desert
The local government and especially the woman mayor, the surpanch, are very corrupt. The surpanch is almost never around, and takes money for herself and doesn’t look out for her villagers at all. She is 6 months away from the end of her one 5-year term.
The Indian government guarantees work to men living under the poverty line, but when the men go to work, they do not get their full promised salary.

Because of many of these problems, most kids (male and female) do not want to continue to live in the village when they are adults; they want to move to a big city like Jodhpur where there are more opportunities for them. For men, they can find work. For the girls they can attend high school and college with the promise of a better life.

The fact that Setrawa is very conservative is noticeable in many ways, especially in the division of the sexes. Once they reach a certain age, the boys and girls do not spend time together because it is unacceptable to do so. Hence, all of us from Stanford were given very strict guidelines on how to act towards members of the opposite sex (simply, nothing.) However, when talking to a bunch of high school boys, they asked me if I was married (and looked sad when I said no), then they asked me if anyone in the group was my girlfriend (guys and girls walking together, they must be together, and we had been instructed to take all boyfriends/girlfriends and not talk about them or even say we have them because it would put us in the stereotype as promiscuous Americans.)

One thing in rural Rajasthan that is common is guys showing each other friendship by holding each other’s hands. For me, it is strange to have such a conservative society and then see two guys holding their hands (even if it is a sign of friendship.) However, in big cities like Jodhpur, such hand holding no longer happens (and I wonder when it will stop happening in a village like Setrawa.) In fact, just before the following picture with a village elder (he was in charge of welfare before he retired, and is still very important to the community), he grabbed my hand, which I found very unusual...

August 15th is Indian Independence Day (62 years!) so we went to two main celebrations. The first one was at the public school where there was a big opening dance that included all of the guys at the school (and some of the youngest girls.) The second celebration was outside the Simbahli Trust school, and the girls from the school came up in about groups of 2-5 to sing or read and even dance. The following picture is the celebration at the school (the white uniform is the honor reserved for the best of the class.
This next picture is all of the girls at Simbhali Trust after the second celebration.

At both celebrations, we had ‘seats of honour’ at the front, so we could see a lot, even if we couldn’t understand what they said. At the public school celebration, I ended up having to speak to the 1,000 or so people there as one of the 5 representatives of the Stanford group. It is unusual to speak to such a big audience, especially one which doesn’t really understand what you are saying. Then, at the second celebration, all of us had prepared a dance to present that lasted about a minute, a dance that was put together by one of our group leaders, Sagar, who does Indian dance at Stanford. Even though we weren’t that great (or at least I wasn’t) the audience loved it so much, we had to go back out and do it again, and we ended up being more successful. But, how often do Indians get to see such a wide variety of people doing their style of dance?

At one point, when talking to a little boy and trying to communicate (they don’t really know English that well and they don’t understand an American accent) and he asked for a pen which I figured he would write down what he was trying to say. So I got out my pen and handed it over, and he just pocketed it. Definitely no way I could ask for it back though considering the situation, but still something to watch out for.

Just outside of Setrawa, we all stayed at a guest house belonging to the head of Simbahli trust. At night we slept on the roof where we could feel the nice evening breeze (very important to falling asleep!) We walked a little ways for Lunch and Dinner, for which we got very typical Rajasthani cuisine (which was just a bit hard on the stomach, but I am getting more used to it.) To go to the village, we would ride a jeep over all of the sand surrounding the guest house and get into town. Although it is a very bumpy ride, as long as my stomach is fine, I really enjoy it.

Then, Sunday (today) we headed back to Jodhpur, and then had time to rest up in the FSD office. They were particularly nice and made some chicken nuggets served with ketchup. Man, I have never craved American food so much.

The following, and last picture, is from the roof of the house I stayed in Setrawa, just after sunset. If you look closely, you can see some of the staw houses in the area.

Ok, that is all for now, and later tonight I move in with my first of two host families with Dennis.

From India,

-Andrew