Culture Shock

I’m sitting in a clean room with clean hair and air conditioning. My stomach is full of food and I have a bathroom within walking distance. It has clean running water. The room smells like perfume.

            It’s strange that I can have this. It’s strange that out of the thousands of people I saw in India, only the Brahmans might have a chance to live like this. The wealthy live in disgusting luxury that mockingly encroaches up against the poor. All the rest live in a poverty that is indescribable, a poverty that doesn’t exist in the U.S.

            My bus had just ushered me to my secluded boat, away from a city that was a swarm of people that didn’t have enough room to live. And now sitting in a quiet room away from any humans felt wrong. I felt like I was floating somewhere between my “real” life and the images I had just escaped. The images were of the trash and filth overflowing the alleys and streets of Agra and Varanassi, cities that couldn’t handle the amount of people that they held.

             The people were polar opposites of those I saw in Africa. The people in the townships of Cape Town were beyond happy. The children played in the streets and the houses were painted pink and blue. But on the streets of India, smiling is not a part of daily life. There is no form of trash removal or sewage regulation. Children, mothers and men begged ferociously and clung to our arms as we walked into mosques or down stone streets. It was overwhelming and dirty, intense and beautiful, and a place that will flash in front of my eyes when I “pass out.”

This sure isn’t jersey because… the president is a woman.

The Ganges

After a short flight and hours of driving, our charter bus obnoxiously pulled up on the side of the road in a smaller village of Varanasi. About a hundred rickshaws lined the roads- skinny men sat ready to pull two people of any weight on the leather seats attached to their bikes. I jumped on a bearded-mans rickshaw and set-off on a crazy ride to the Ganges River. There are no rules of the road, only anticipation… of the cars and bikes coming from every direction. As we whizzed passed lit up stores and stands of street food the sun set behind us and the town quieted, ready for the daily rituals.

            By the time we pulled up to the “parking lot,” it was dark. We had come to see the sunset ceremonies by the sacred Ganges (the Indians pronounce it as Ganga-es). The ritual was the most memorable and beautiful experience of my life. It started when I left our larger group. I went with one friend down to the edge of the river, led by a little girl who brought us to an old man praying. Smiling, he taught us his Hindu prayer, half-singing and half-chanting and then stamped our foreheads with his orange paint. As the custom goes, we said our prayer, placed a candle-lit flower in the Ganges and watched it float away.

            Now that it was completely dark music drifted toward us and we drifted toward it. My friend innocently asked a man dressed in a beautiful orange robe if we could sit near the singers. We were led right up to the front and plopped next to the musicians. The man who sat us there ended up being the head Brahman priest. His six young students stepped to their positions on decorated platforms. They looked about my age, maybe younger. But when they started to sing and circle the pots of incense over their heads, stepping to the drumbeat, they became much, much older. My friend and I were both crying when our guide found us and told us it was time to go.

 

This sure isn’t jersey because… thousands of people gather in one place for a ceremony that happens every day.

 

Love

Everyone knows the photo of the Taj Mahal, but this place is an incredible tribute to love. The Shah Jahan used his absurd power to build the incredible tomb for his favorite wife… the others are buried in smaller tombs around the vicinity- I’m assuming they didn’t get along.

            The tomb is symmetrically perfect, the marble changes color with the sun and hundreds of people are dressed in beautiful saris or suits to honor one of the seven wonders of the man-made world.

            We all took off our shoes and padded into the tomb. Chiseled marble screens were the only source of light so we felt our way around the mausoleum. Jahan had designed the place down to the last details in the chiseled marble flowers that bordered the rooms’ entryways. Outside, black marble calligraphy along the walls quoted the Koran and painted marble zigzags crawled up the sides of the windows. It’s a tomb, it’s a mosque, but mostly it’s a beautiful work of art. 

This sure isn’t jersey because… in the entrance-line, men are sent straight through the gates while women wait 30 minutes so they can be frisked. 

More than a Weekend

I arrived in Walvish (Walfish) Bay on the 19th. THat was three days ago! In three days I drove an hour and a half into the desert, climbed up a pre-historic rock formation, got an astronomy lesson, invaded the nearby city of Swakopmund, kissed a seal named Sally, saw a humpback whale, ate African oysters on a catamaran and a toga fish burger from a township, played soccer with a 10-year-old, met kids at a working women's center, an AIDS health center and in the home of my tour guide Freid.

I'm on cloud nine. I've never seen so much happiness, hard-work and respect for life. Everyone is positive despite the 30 percent HIV rates and 40 percent unemployment. My tour guide, like the majority of youths, are struggling against these odds. He started his own touring company with the help of a European sponsor who taught and funded the startup. Many people are right along with him as they elevate above the lack of industries by turning their homes into businesses to support their large families.

As the only son, Freid feeds the mouths of the nine other people living in his 2-bedroom home. He took us there to meet his 4 sisters and brother-in-laws, 3 nephews and to show us the five additional covering on the back of his home to accommodate for the eight relatives that will be returning from sea when the fishing season ends.

"My family was so happy to meet you. You have put food in their mouths. You have made this all possible."

This sure isn't jersey because... I was served bugs in a bowl and I bought a 20 cent fish burger.

Star Gazing in Namibia

It took an hour of driving through the desert to get to the beautiful canyon wghere we'd be sleeping. It would have been shorter but out line of 8 SUVs got lost a couple of times between diamond mines and olive farms.

Millennia ago, shale, quarts and volcanic rock erupted out of the flat, arud terrain. Two hundred-foot towering walls remained, which sheltered us from the dusty winds. They also enveloped the 40 shwanky two-man tents and three bonfires that were set up for our touristy pleasure.

Nice dining tables were set up for a delicious buffet meal that the our two guides cooked themselves. They served fresh papaya with balsamic, steamed vegetables (including the most succulent potato) and an orange-glazed desert topped with homemade caramel-cream sauce- for beverages, a full bar and rich coffee. These Namibians sure knew how to make us AMerican happy.

Besides the food, the view from the top of the rock walls were amazing. A pre-dinner climb in my top-siders was painful, but worth it enough to wake up at 6 the next morning to do it again during sunrise. And our attempt at meditating was all the more beautiful since the first climb was at 6 pm, when the sun dipped below the nearest rock formation and our call of "we are the goddesses of Africa!" still echoed from wall to wall.

I can't believe I'm in Africa. 

This sure isn't jersey because... our astronomer was pointing to the Southern Cross. So long North Star!

We're Not Alone!

Today as I lay on the pool deck reading "Heart of Darkness"- guess what I saw? A bird. It was the most comforting thing I'd seen in days. We were less than a day from land!

 

I'm not only excited to reach Namibia because the incessant rocking and rolling is getting to my sanity, or because of the amazing memories that will be made, but because we will get a break from moving east. For the past week we've had to groggily get up for breakfast's 8:30 cut-off after pushing our clocks forward the night before. Our fast pace moves us into new time zones every other, if not every day. But it beats a 6 hour one time shift and 2 days of jet lag.

This sure isn't jersey because... people applaud the site of seagulls.

In the Middle

It's strange not to have seasons. It's even more strange to move in and out of them, north to South to them.

 

And because of the sped cycle I miss autumn. THere are no leaves on the boat to turn colors and float away. Or apple picking and pumpkin carving. But there IS an ocean- so I'm not complaining.

A lot of you have been wondering about the middle of the Atlantic. Truthfully, it's not as spectacular as you (if your like me) might think.

Like you'd imagine its blue for as far as you can see. But even though we are a significant distance from land, the water is as calm as it is near the coast. A difference: Yesterday the captain's voice rang through the loudspeaker with an unnerving comment: "We have moved for exactly 48 hours without seeing signs of any other vessel" (except some whale spouts).  It made it a little more real. It made us realize that as we floated over the great divide at the fast pace of 20.2 knots, we, and the high tech sonars, were alone from horizon to horizon.

This sure isn't jersey because... students can volunteer to go on pirate watch.