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Published: February 6th 2008
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So, today was the first day of our AFP. We started off the morning as a large group at Madras University. A couple of people spoke about the university and specifically about the Gandhi Institute for Peace and Conflict Studies at the university. The English was a bit rough, as was the microphone, so I didn’t hear as much as I would have liked about the program. The highlight of the morning was definitely the cookies and chai tea they passed out. Mom, it was the best chai I’ve ever had…you need to book a ticket to India just to have a cup of tea.
In the afternoon my small group headed out on a tour of Chennai. We learned that the town has a population 7.2 million, which makes it the 4th largest city in India. Our first stop was at Fort St George which was the first territorial possession of the British in India. There wasn’t much that was exciting inside…some guns that I took pictures of for Dad. The second stop was the Chennai National Museum, which was boring. We saw lots of bronze statues of Hindi Gods from as early as the 4th century. It was
me in a sari
which i ended up buying...how can you say no? it's too beautiful! exciting for about 30 seconds and by the end of 20 minutes of lecture and descriptions I was practically in tears. The second half of our tour got a lot better. We were taken down a back road to a Hindi temple. We had to remove our shoes and walk a long distance down the road barefoot (I don’t even want to know what kind of diseases my feet now have) and then we entered the temple. We were blessed with ash on our foreheads and observed the people going about their daily spiritual rituals. There was the cutest boy playing on a statue of an elephant that just stared at us, probably because we look so different. Our final stop of the day was the St. Thomas Cathedral, where Thomas the apostle is actually buried. He was killed in Chennai in 72 AD and was buried here…later, a church was resurrected by the remains in his honor. We were able to enter the church while a service was happening and it’s the first time in a long time I’ve seen a religion that is somewhat familiar to me. Of course I hadn’t a clue what they were saying, but
man selling flowers
this was outside of the temple, the flowers are gifts for the gods seeing a bunch of people in saris and other traditional dress worshiping Jesus was a bit odd. I think I’m going to try to go back on Sunday for mass…we’ll see how that goes.
Again, I’m so amazed by this place. The women walk around wearing gorgeous bright colors and silk and sparkles, with their hair and outfits perfect. And they are walking barefoot on some of the most undeveloped, impoverished streets I have ever seen. The background is dirty and disgusting and the people are so beautiful. I’ve seen so many people that I can’t believe are even alive…I could probably count every bone in their bodies. I saw a woman carrying her two babies begging for money on the streets. So many people just have a sad look in their eyes, it’s hard to imagine their day to day lives. If there was one thing I regret about this experience it is that I won’t be able to actually live their life…eat what they eat, work where they work, live how they live.
Tonight a group of us decided to stay in a hotel to get off the ship and find some internet. The security getting
at the temple
after i got ashed, our tour guide was explaining the significance on and off the ship is VERY tight…more strict than Thailand and China combined. We were leaving through immigration and we all had our laptops with us…we were told we had to go to customs and declare them. Fair enough. We headed back a way to customs and had to write out a statement describing what we were taking and the value. They signed and stamped it and off we were again to immigration. The man took our document, looked at it a while, told us to have a seat, talked to some other man, looked at the document some more, looked at our computers, talked to another man, and so on. Finally he motioned to us and said “dollars”. He was asking us to pay him…a bribe if you will. We said no. He then walked over to the bench and took something out of a pouch. He unrolled and unfolded it and we saw at least two dozen shiny bullets. He then reached over for his rifle and I have never in my life fled from a place so quickly. I don’t know what the hell this man was trying to pull, but I wasn’t willing to stick
around and find out. We went back to customs where the men were nice and spoke some English, told them what happened and they went to talk to the immigration officials. They exchanged what seemed like some heated words, talked to some other men, looked at our computers, looked at our documents, and finally let us through. Now you have to imagine this for what it is…it’s a hut that looks like nothing more than a roadside fruit stand. The men are dirty, smelly and carry huge scary guns. Anyway, we got to our hotel without being shot and are enjoying some internet and freedom from the boat. I’m still not exactly sure what happened at that immigration place, but it scared the life out of me.
I have many more thoughts on India, but not enough time or energy to put my thoughts into words. Hopefully my experience will continue to be enriching and there will be no more guns involved. Today was the second time in my travels that I have been genuinely scared…the first being in Bosnia…and both times involved big weapons. I’m not sure what I think of this place yet, but it’s definitely different
than anything I have ever experienced, and definitely different than anything I expected…
Also, I added pictures to the first blog on India (yesterday’s blog), so be sure to check those out as well.
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Will
non-member comment
Looks fantastic, and again, a brilliant description. Well played on the immigration situation - that sounds scary as hell!