Arrived in India, relaxing in Pondy


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Asia » India » Pondicherry
January 17th 2006
Published: May 11th 2006
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Hello from INDIA!

After a long and tedious journey I'm finally settled in Pondicherry! Pondy hasn't changed as far as I can see, it is still the busy (although calm for India) town it was the last time I was here. The warmth is excruciating for a Norwegian coming from Norwegian winter to Indian winter, from several minus to 22 degrees at NIGHT, during the day the temperature rises to at least 33-34 degrees. I'm not complaining as such, it is a comfortable summer temperature after all, and its bound to get so much warmer (33-34 at NIGHT!), but it is rather rough for a warm blooded Norwegian who likes his window to be open at night in the Norwegian winter!

What I'm doing here – short hand version
Anyway, let me update those of you who neither knew that I'm in India nor what I'm doing here. I'm in the starting phase of my master degree in Social Anthropology at NTNU – Trondheim. After a couple of months in Trondheim preparing for field work and taking some theoretical courses I'm now about 6 hours with bus away Velankanni, a town of 10000 where I'll conduct my 6 months of field work (although a small town it's visited by a HUGE number of pilgrims each year/day)! The shorthand version of my intended research is an examination of various aspects of the post-disaster situation in Velankanni. The disaster being the 2004 Indian Ocean Tsunami which hit Velankanni and the district its situated in (Nagapattinam) hard, by far the worst hit in India.

From Norway to India: the trip.
I left Oslo 4 am Friday the 13th, and landed in Mumbai the same day 7.30 PM (around midnight Indian time), a rather smooth journey with nothing special happening. I hadn't decided at that point how to get to the south-east coast of India (first stop being Pondy), it would be roughly 30-32 hours by train and bus (depending on transit) costing me about 60-70 NOK, or I could take a plane costing me 450 – 530 NOK. I opted for the plane, which I thought I would catch at about 6 AM (train didn't leave till 2 PM the following day), seeing as that was only 5 hours away I saw no point cashing out for an overpriced hotel. However, after negotiating my way through the hordes of auto and taxi drivers trying to get me here and there, and giving me conflicting information (go there, not there, here and there and back and forth...) I managed to find the local bus leaving from the international airport to the domestic airport. Once i got there i quickly realized that the early planes I had intended to get would cost me around 1200 NOK, much much more than I was willing to pay. So I booked a ticket with Air Deccan for 1.15 PM, 12 hours away (at 500 NOK). Not wanting to go through all the negotiating and the trying to figure out what's up and what's down with the auto/taxi drivers i settled inn for a 12 hour wait at the airport. Seeing as I had gotten some 4 hours sleep after getting up at 4AM the previous day this was maybe not the best idea. Seating at the airport was scarce and the only sleep I got was 1 hour collapsing in some uncomfortable chair a few hours before my plane left. The 1 ½ hours the plane took was heaven, I slept the whole way.

In Chennai I met an Israeli guy about 40-50 years old that had no real clue as to what to do. I tipped him that if he wanted a calm and mellow start on his vacation the coastal town of Mahabalipuram would suit him well. He took my advice and we set off to the central bus station to take each our own bus. The auto driver taking us insisted we go to the stop after the central bus station as it was much shorter getting there. Luckily for us he decided to help us find our buses, Indian local buses barely stop and there is no information in English so this was a true blessing (which was why I wanted to get to the central bus stand in the first place). What was NOT a blessing was the until then for me unknown harvest festival celebrated all over India by Hindus, Christians and Muslims alike. Saturday as it turned out was the first day of the 3 days long festival and half of Chennai was travelling out to see family (a slight exaggeration.). 4 buses passed me by (they leave every 10-20 minutes), all filled to the brim. On the 5th I/we saw our chances to throw me into the bus, as I was standing on the bottom stair leading into the bus the driver decided to jump start and throw himself into the traffic, about 10 Indian men grabbed me and my backpack and got me into the bus (wasn't really dangerous at all, I might be guilty of over dramatizing, it was just typical overcrowded-Indian-style-bus 😉. There I stood for 4-5 hours trying to keep my backpack out of the way. At this point i finally realized i was in India!! 😊 On the bus i also met my first informant! Well you can't really call him that... But Charles, a Indian catholic in his mid twenties studying computer engineering in Chennai, and I talked for a couple of hours standing in the bus about Velankanni (which he had visited twice, before and after the tsunami) and the tsunami in general. He had a lot to say and was friendly and proficient in English It was my first real taste of the Indian feelings about the tsunami, and my first real “anthropological field experience”, and I enjoyed it immensely! 😊

Lodging was of course not easy to find once in Pondy either, I walked around for a couple of hours trying to find myself a decent Guest House (backpack on my aching shoulders and tired as all hell). I found two places where I could sleep, one was on the floor in the entrance hall of the Guest House i stayed 10 weeks in last time (courtesy of the boss there, Swami), the other in a run down hostel in a rather dirty room infested with mosquitoes, and i needed my proper sleep... In the end I saw no other option but to call Culture Studies in Norway (they have a study centre in Pondy I attended 2 years ago) to ask them whether they had any lodging I could borrow (I had been tipped by a guy at the institute in Trondheim to do this, but hadn't gotten as far), they were very helpful and gave me the number to Selva – their Indian fix-it-all. Unfortunately I couldn't get in touch with him, but Pierre, business partner with Culture Studies and the owner and manager of Satsanga (a hugely popular French restaurant in Pondy) set me up in his guest house. I collapsed on the bed about 00.30 AM local time and slept some good 12 hours!

(Yesterday night (Thursday) i swapped sleeping places and I'm not staying in a Culture Studies' owned room in Kamachi.)

Relaxation!
Since then I have been walking around Pondy letting memories flood me and visiting old favourite spots (my old guest house – Sri Rama Guest House, Hot Breads, Peepin, i-way, the local Indian veg restaurant close to Sri Rama, Bamboo Hut, coffee.com, and of course chai and fresh juice stalls). Sunday I went to a classical Karnatakan music concert at Pooja's place together with an American couple staying in the same apartment as me, it was fascinating and quite good! Yesterday (Thursday) I had my first real Indian breakfast, dosa on palm leaf with this and that with it. My finger eating skills has apparently dropped drastically and I made a mess out of my fingers, it was good tho! I waited a few days getting a scooter so i would get used to the worst left-over from English colonialism – left side driving, now I have my two wheels and getting around in the warmth is suddenly bearable. I'm generally just relaxing, getting used to the warmth, the food, and the atmosphere, reading, as well as getting a few things fixed here and there!

Next stop
I intend to stay here in Pondy a few more days, need to stock up some supplies (clothes etc.) as I'm not sure on the availability of this and that in Velankanni, I might choose to stay over the next weekend seeing as weekend is probably a more busy time in Velankanni than usual. Might chop up the 6 hour bus ride a bit and see something I haven't seen on the road down there.

To sum it up: enjoying myself immensely, both the bed and tummy bugs have still to find me so I'm as happy as can be!


Hope everyone is good wherever they are! You will hear from me again in not too long!

Håvard


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