One Year...an attempt at a wrap up

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One year ago today, I packed up my stuff, hauled it in a cab with Sean and Helen to the airport and took off for my year in India. One whole year ago.

I'm not sure how to go about wrapping up a year of experiences that encompass some of the worst and best moments of my life to date, it seems like quite a daunting task...to put it lightly.

The thing about journeys like this is that the beginning and end of every journey is filled with emotion. Whether it be fear, excitement, relief, nostalgia, anticipation, sadness, or hesitation, it is there, impossible to remove from the event. Of course these emotions come and go in different strengths throughout the trip itself, but never is it so poignant as in the actual commencement and conclusion of a journey. The journey could be a bus ride down the winding roads from Kodaikanal to Madurai, or the embarking on a year’s sojourn in a foreign country. Regardless of the type of journey, it is the emotion that tends to be what we most clearly recall, perhaps that is one reason why our goings and comings are always so interesting. One never knows for certain what emotions will surround a particular beginning or end until they are there, standing at the airport, sitting on the train, stepping on the bus, watching the ground shrink as the plane slowly climbs further from the old place, gradually approaching the new. Even if you have made a thousand journeys to the same place, the emotions present at the beginning and end of each may be different.

Of course we do not encounter one simple emotion in the moment when we begin a journey; mostly I suspect, because every beginning is an end in itself. When beginning a new adventure, we’re leaving an old one at the same time. There are loose ends to tie up, places to visit one last time, and most difficult of all, people to say goodbye to. In some cases we know these people will be there for us, and that we will see them again before too long, in others the goodbye can be made particularly painful with the knowledge that our paths may never meet again.

Thinking back on when I left, I’m not sure I know what I was aiming to get out of it. At the time I originally thought to leave for India, I think part of me was desperate for an escape: escape from routine, escape from a recent failed relationship, escape from settling down too fast. I had very little, if any, idea of the place and culture to which I was escaping.

It's funny, really. I could always picture my leaving: going through the dreaded goodbyes and trying to do so while keeping my pride, clearing my stuff, packing up, etc. I could picture my return: getting off the plane, seeing everyone again, telling stories of whatever adventures I've had and hearing stories of my friends' year in return. But for all I tried, I could never actually picture myself in India, actually making these stories I was already so eager to tell.

Perhaps my inability to imagine myself in India was a blessing in disguise as there was no way I could have imagined the things that I experienced there. Sometimes when I think back on it, I wonder how it is that I managed in Chennai with all of the restrictions on me. I recall being unhappy, but I know I still had fun times there...fun times that I think I overlook too often these days. I always tell people about how Thanu and I ate after everyone else in the house had finished their meals, but I often fail to say how much I treasured that time of day when the two of us chatted in the kitchen and I listened to her explain the day's serials to me. It was my favorite time of day, and many of my fondest memories of Chennai took place in that kitchen.

I can't, of course, forget about all the people in Tamil Nadu who opened their houses to me. Particularly Geetha Auntie and Venkatesan Uncle in Madurai and Kesavan Apa and Rajamuthu Ama in Ramnad who took me in as family and gave me homes. Rajamuthu Ama even suggested that I leave some sets of clothes there so that every time I come to visit I won't have to pack much. Indeed the hospitality was unparalleled.

Coming to Mumbai was a huge shock for me, and I quickly found myself swept up with my new ex-pat friends (and boyfriend), going out at night, working during the day, etc. Fortunately for me, these friends gave me a release from my stress at work, which often showed me just how many wits I must have, as everyday I seemed to be at a new wit's end.

It's funny, as I mentioned before, prior to me leaving for India, I could imagine only the before and after of the trip, but not “the during”. Yet, when living in Mumbai, even up to the moment that Chris took me to the airport, I had a difficult time picturing a homecoming. I didn't know how I would deal with a room of my own and a bed of my own, or an apartment without Sangeeta, our talkative and sweet maid, coming in everyday. India had become such a part of me, that I hated the idea of it becoming nothing more than a sound byte.

Since coming back, everyone has asked me about my trip, about what I saw and what I did, my favorite part, the strangest part, how it changed me.

Perhaps it is a cop out to say, but I really can't say that I know the answer to any of these questions. I know I'm changed. I know I'm more independent, and I see that particularly in how it affects my relationships with people. Before, I had a friend or two upon whom I really leaned. People who I felt I needed. I guess I don't feel like I need them now. I still want them, I'll probably always want them, but there's a huge difference between needing and wanting. So I've changed that way, but I know that's not it.

There is so much to love about India, especially when you allow yourself to go as deep into it as I did (though lots of that depth was just because I was thrown in to it). At the same time, the deeper you go, the stranger the things you see become. For instance, I never saw people smoking crack before, but it happened on P. D'Mello Road where my kids lived.

P. D'Mello will probably always be one of my favorite places in India. The relationships I formed with my students there (there, not in class) kept me going through the worst days in class. I still miss arriving in front of the bus stop, with the taxi walla (cab driver) reluctant to let me leave his cab while in a slum and suddenly hearing a voice breaking out from the noise of the street "Didi! Shaaroni Didi is come!" it would call out, and soon many voices joined it.

I recently read in a book that travel, true travel is among the most selfish endeavors one can undertake. After this trip, I think I have to concur. Travel is purely selfish as it calls for the traveler to abandon her life and the people in it, going off on her own seeking new places, new people, new adventures or a new self.

A year is a long time for me to have abandoned my life, and it's strange to be back in Boston, trying to find where I fit in the now changed threads of my friends' lives (as a year is a long time for them, too. People often ask me if I'm going to write a book, or stories or anything on my adventures, and I suppose it's a viable option, but in many ways I don't feel ready yet. My friend Rob told me that I'll be finding how this year has changed me years from now, and I agree. I feel like I'm constantly figuring out small changes in myself, but what holds and what doesn't when India is but a far off memory, that's the real test.

And so it is that my year has ended. Not with the results or experiences I predicted I would have, but with many more. I've gained friends from all over the world. I've gained confidence in myself, and lost some confidence in people sometimes. I've seen some of the best the world has and some of the worst (sometimes in the same place, at the same time). And I've learned how much I can take and how well I can adapt. More than all that, I've gained India. She is a land of exquisite wealth and exquisite poverty, and I had the fortune to experience a great deal of both. For all the love and hate, it's funny how a place can grow on you. I used to say India was like a fungus to me. At first I hated it, but then it got under my skin and kept growing. OK, I know, not the best analogy, but it's true. My friend Marianne told me, "if you don't run away from India as soon as you set foot on the ground, it will always be a part of you," and she's right. Even now, having been away from India for only a month, I feel an intense desire to return, as though I'm being beckoned by a mother.

And let me tell you, my friends, at that point--the point that began when I got to the airport to leave her land and go off on new adventures and ends seemingly never--that's when I realized why this land is called "Mother India".

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