Hope this won't be the last post by kt

I have been unable to blog until now. The words simply aren't coming to me. There are things that I want to mention in the interest of full disclosure, but I also must respect all those involved and exercise professional courtesy, even if certain individuals do not deserve that.

Instead of writing of negative experiences, which thankfully were few and far in between, I would like to give props to those who deserve it.

In no particular order:

The Indian delegates. Anu, Anil, Bharath, Krishna, Vikas, Roopa, Fathima, and Anand. I know that we all had doubts about the effectiveness of our work, if any, but you all quickly dispelled any doubts that we had. Even if it was different than what we all originally imagined, it was clear from your skit at the closing ceremony that we did have an impact. More importantly, it was clear that you guys learned from this experience and our hope is that you will take it all to heart and continue the work that we started together.

Anantadev Das. For your honesty and your patience. This program would not have been a success without you and I know that we all hope to be able to work with you again.

Chandra Mouli. I think we all fell in love with your giggle! What I am most impressed with is your positive attitude at all times. We know it is not easy, as you always say. Yet, you manage to pull it off and it is clear that you have the best interests of the Indian Deaf at heart.

Smitha's family.

Patti, who is Smitha's grandmother. For she graciously welcomed us into her home on several occasions and gave us food, a place to sleep, shower, and rest.

Rathna and JS also deserve huge thank yous from us. Not only are they allowing us to stay with them right now, but they also let the four of us stay here when we first arrived in Bangalore. I know we all fell in love with their coffee and more importantly, both of them as well.

JS for showing us what a real banana leaf meal was like. Rathna for force feeding us and making us as comfortable as possible.

Ambe. Smitha's cousin who gave up his time for us on numerous occasions to fetch autos for us. As well as the time that he took to help lead autos to designations, or all the times he went to grab food for us. He even gave up a couple days to go to Mysore with us. There aren't many 18 year olds you meet that willingly do that for a group of strangers without complaint like he did.

Mega, Ambe's sister, for giving up her one day off to do henna tattoos for us. They came out beautifully and we will post pictures once we return to the states.

Anju, another cousin of Smitha's, also gave up a lot of time for us. She often helped us out with checking out information for us, researching travel arrangements, accompanying us to places. I also never once saw her complain despite the fact that she holds down a full time job herself.

Smitha's Mysore aunt, Shashi, for allowing us to stay at her place several nights and for making us feel so welcome!

Tamer, for his patience with 7 pretty strong personalities. 8 if you include his own personality as well! Also for always keeping us in the loop as much as possible and for refusing to budge when necessary.

Smitha, my words cannot express the huge debt of gratitude that we all owe you. I truly believe you are largely responsible for this trip going as smoothly as it did. Thank you for showing us a whole new world that most of us never knew about before. It is clear where your heart belongs and I'm excited to see what you accomplish here in the years to come.

It is surreal to think that this experience has mostly come to an end. There are so many little things that I wanted to blog about but could never fit it in my long entries. The near-misses that we all had with various vehicles. Our different shower experiences, our encounters with a ghost at the lodge, all of our interactions with the Indian delegates, the way the Indian drivers drive, our experiences with the various modes of transportation, all the different foods that we have tasted, and just the various intrinciate details of Indian life.

I noticed the other day that I no longer smelled anything. When I first came to India, my senses were all assaulted from the various sights, sounds, tastes, and smells. Especially, the various smells! Good conmingled with bad. I wondered aloud to Wyatte if America would be a different sensory overload.

Lizzie said this in an email that she sent some of us:

"I Am currently reading "cultural smart! India" and it says in the intro (which I never noticed before till now): "it is impossible to be unmoved by india. 'Visit india, and you will never be the same again,' say the tourist brochures. It is true. The very name stirs the imagination, and a visit is an adventure. India will change you."

So true.
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No sympathy for paparazzi by kt

Sympathy for movie stars. That is how I feel after today. What did we do? We visited Tumkur and three deaf schools in the area as well. This brings our total number of schools visited thus far on this trip to 12. Wow. Just when we think that we cannot possibly see nor learn anthing new from yet another school, we are quickly proven wrong.

The city of Tumkur sits amongst the mountains that my discerning Colorado eyes gave a stamp of approval to, even if they were a tad but on the small side. it also has forests of palm trees, a dichtomy I couldn't quite get used to. Tumkur reminds me a lot of Goa. More of a nature place with farm animals, herders, villages, dirt roads, and so on. It was a nice escape from the hustle and bustle of Bangalore, albeit for only one day.

First up on the docket was the Helen Keller Integrated school for the deaf. My excitement at seeing hearing and deaf students attending a deaf school quickly dissipated when it was explained to me that the hearing students are only there because their parents have no choice. You see, many Indian parents seem to believe that if you send a hearing child to a school with children that aren't "normal", that hearing child will acquire whatever disability the "abnormal" children have.

The parents of said children are simply too poor to afford the school fees so they are "reduced" to sending their child to a deaf school.

We posed for the obligatory group pictures, shook dozens of hands, and loaded up into a too-small van: which seems to be the theme of this trip.

Next up was the Red Cross School for the deaf that was established and is operated under a trust fund from the Rotary Club. The students learn Kannada and the schoolhouse itself is tiny with only a few rooms. The purpose of our school visits are to interact with the kids and to learn more about what we can do to support the Indian deaf. However, the whole trip turned into one huge political event full of photo opportunities and that left me and some others feeling a little bit violated and used.

I met and shook hands with various leaders of the school, members of the rotary club, community members, etc. They all seemed more excited at the prospect of us being Americans rather than members of a delegation; the GRO delegation.

The purpose of our visit was quickly lost when I was continually sought out to pose for many many pictures for and with many people. Did I mention the number of people I posed for pictures with? It was a lot of pictures.

Everytime I sat down, I was asked to stand up and pose for another picture. I didn't get to interact with any of the kids really. Even the kids' games with the delegates were constantly interrupted by adults wanting to take pictures of them with the Americans. I kept wanting to switch places with Smitha as she is the coordinator and should be the one in all of the pictures. Or Chandru, Anandandev, or Tamer. They even kept grabbing the researcher, Michelle, to pose for pictures even though she is not a part of our group nor does she contribute one iota to our team nor our mission, all because she was a token white person as well.

The women workers were of lower caste and they were often ordered around and not included in the pictures. I asked them to pose for a couple pictures with me because I felt bad about their exclusion, and that seemed to make their day, which disgusted me. Not because I don't like making people happy, but just because I view myself as plain and ordinary old KT. There is nothing special about me, there is nothing about me that should make the focus all about me and have the children and the purpose of this trip be neglected.

I was just really turned off and unsure of what to think. To get all of this admiration merely because of my nationality or because of the color of my skin felt wrong. At the same time, I couldn't refuse or not participate as that would give off a bad impression or send the wrong message. But, my conflicted mind wondered, what type of message am I sending by participating in the political agendas of some leaders? Perhaps it is merely a choice between two evils and the lesser of either. More on that in a minute.

The original plan for today included only 2 school visits, but we were surprised with a trip to another school. My initial impressions were more of an, "osh kosh omigosh! Look at the sheer number of chillun roaming the streets here!". This was the Integrated Education Center established by Shree Shree Shree Dr. Shiva Kumar Swami, who set up a lot of schools in the area and stuff like that.

When we disembarked the vans, we were treated to a swarm of children, which I videotaped. Ganesh also took pictures, then we inadvertently caused a mini-stampede amongst the children when they swarmed the steps and the older students beat them back with sticks. It caused some students to fall and down the other students went like dominos. We felt so bad as we were climbing the concrete spiral staircase, but we knew that we would have made the situation worse if we stayed behind to help.

So, we walked across the balcony into a great big room full of obedient students lined up in neat little rows and making nary a move. The teachers and directors explained that the area had at least a thousand school children, and most attend schools established by that man I mentioned earlier. He is still alive at the young age of 100, but not doing well at the moment as he was just admitted to a hospital a couple days ago.

So, the children that are poor migrate from the villages and see their parents maybe once a year. The deaf children live, eat, and sleep at the school. They also have school everyday too, imagine that. The girls are sent home in order to keep them separated from the boys, I believe the exact quote was, "so that the boys don't make whores out of the girls.". Lovely, comments like those make me love the patriarchial society of India more and more everyday.

No, I shouldn't be sarcastic as I do love India more and more every day. Comments like those frustrate me because I see a different India emerging that is trying to break the shackles of that oppression.

When we left the school, we could see that the mob was growing from the balcony. All of the children were waving to us and of course we were waving back even though it felt funny to do so. It felt like we were famous and we all kept commenting on how we were just *insert skin color here* Americans.

Weaving through the crowd, I saw one of the Indian delegates, Bharath, holding the most adorable puppy and props to Smitha for calling me over immediately to show me. I asked to hold him and he fell asleep in my arms, so cute! I wanted to adopt him. I want to adopt all of the dogs that I see in india! Well, not the one in the yard that jumped up on a fence the other day as I walked by and started barking inches from my face. India can keep that particular dog, he nearly made me mess me pants.

I digress, walking to the tiny vans, kids started swarming us wanting to shake our hands which was fine at first. However, they started to refuse to let go of my hand and this was escalated by them grabbing me and pulling me further into the crowd.

I started to become very concerned for my safety and the safety of the other members of my group. It was like mob mentality, the crowd was simply unruly and out of control and becoming increasingly agitated. The older boys and some adults had to beat off the kids with a stick just to get me out of the crowd that I was entrapped in by the kids who wouldn't let go of my hand nor me. Then they had to beat a path to the waiting van in orfer to usher me and others inside. The children surrounded the van and started to reach inside to grab at us as well as bang on the walls of the van and windows. The van was completely surrounded with children four or five deep at one point. The driver got out and closed our windows and started yelling at the kids and hitting them. That didn't work and he eventually had to just speed up and plow through the crowd just to get the heck out of there.

Meanwhile, we were all sitting inside the van wondering if this was really happening.

After that, we went to a deaf club. The Tumkur Federation for the Deaf. I knew that we were going to a deaf club to meet deaf adults, but I didn't expect to walk in and be on a panel. To make matters worse, the other bus got lost, so it was just Wyatte, Smitha, and I sitting in front of a crowd of 40 or so people smiling all awkwardly because we had no idea about this: another theme of our trip.

It wasn't so bad, it was nice being able to explain GRO's mission and our goal of empowerment. Many seemed to have the misconception that we were there to help them or do something for them. Tamer and Bus kept trying to explain that we were here to empower them, to see what the issues were as identified by them, and to support them in addressing those issues.

There was one vocal man in the crowd that the others kept trying to shush as they seemed embarrassed by his antics. He raised some valid points, however, such as the need for unity. He was clearly very frustrated at the caste system, both in the hearing and deaf world. I wish that they would have let him talk more. As a professor at Gallaudet once told Smitha, there are three things that are needed for change: unity, a common language, and what else?

After we left the club, we ran out of time to do what we planned to do. This is another thing that frustrates all of us immensely. We make plans, but the plans aren't followed or they are modified without our consent and we feel like we have no choice but to follow. For, if we don't, we give a bad impression of us. However, it is also our time and we already give so much of it as it is.

I don't know what the solution to that is. The concept of time here is obviously very fluid. Is it a problem on our part because we are from America and very used to punctuality and getting things done in a timely manner? Or is it a problem on their part for not following the plans that were established and agreed to? Are we trying to cram too much in a short stay? Is it a genuine problem or just a clash of cultures? I don't know the answer to that. All I know is that I don't think the workshops were what we expected and that we would likely have done things differently had we known. Then what we know now. Hindsight is 20/20, c'est la vie. All we can do is learn from it, move forward, and be happy that for the most part, our experience here in India has been very positive even if it has not been what we expected at some points.
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Confused in Bangalore by Wyatte

So far this week, working with the Indian delegates has been a very positive experenice. Yesterday at SKID, we spent about an hour and half with 7 to 10 standard (12 to 18 years old). It was the first time we had a large chunk of time interacting with students and not just visiting the schools.

The previous day, we split up into two groups to come up with various activities and an empowerment workshop. For example, my group decided to use a flower as a representation of yourself and using it as an analogy for achieving your dream. We had each student say their name and what their dream was. Some wanted to become teachers or engineers while others wanted to graduate school or even help the Deaf.

We explained how flowers come in all kinds of different shapes and sizes but they're all beautiful in their own way. We tried to compare the growing and nurturing of the flower to the students themselves with their family and education being the equalivalent of water and sun.

I was disappointed with how the workshop progressed because we had very limited time and it was so hard to be on the same page with the students that we ended up just playing games that we originally intended for later. It was really nice to see the smiles on the students' faces but I couldn't help but feel "empty" for lack of a better word because what will they have gained from our time there other than a break from class for a few hours and a positive impression of Americans? The whole purpose of empowerment was completely lost and I felt like the students were cheated out of something really worthwhile.

This leads to my next point... It seems like the whole concept of empowerment and Deaf rights is not fully understood by our Indian delegates and coordinators. Chandramouli, one of the coordinators who I like a lot and geninuely cares about doing something to immprove everything here, spoke after the students left and essentially said that we gave the students something positive to remember and good entertainment.

That really hit me, I do not think the whole purpose of why we are here is understood by even the coordinators. If the coordinators don't fully understand the concept of empowerment, how can we expect school students to?

While we were playing games, one was Human Chain which basically consisted of people holding hands but knotting them together and then trying to get out of the tangle of arms to form one big circle. The catch is that you can't let go and you need to go over, under and around people. The dynamics were interesting as right from the beginning boys stood on one side and girls on the other.

Once we finally got them to mix it up, they wouldn't hold hands which defeated the entire point of the game. After several false starts, they finally acquiesed and seemed to really enjoy themselves. We had split up the 30+ students into two groups and the difference was startling. One was barely communicating and trying to solve it so fast that they ended up just getting more tangled. The other was a bit more slow and communicated more effectively, eventually getting out of the tangle.

I thought it was a good representation of the two sides of India that we've seen so far. Its hard to remember that India is a young country, having achieved independence only 60O years ago and before the British, they weren't even unified as a country but rather many separate kingdoms.

This is why the challenge of creating one Indian sign language is so daunting and a lot of people resist changing their language anyway - which I can't really blame them for but considering the extreme conditions here and amount of people, I think the only way Indian Deaf will really be able to exert change on a nationwide scale would be with the unifying force of having one language to communicate in. This doesn't even include the fact that the various Deaf leaders here tend to fight among themselves and not work together, it s very fustrating and there is no easy solution.
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An invisible identity by alf

Just now, we got back from SKID and said our goodbyes to the Indian delegates. One of them is a Muslim and has been taking off her black burqa before meeting with us. I've never seen a woman put a burqa on before, so when I watched her putting it back on to leave for home, I couldn't believe what I saw. To me, it was almost like an illusion. What I was seeing couldn't be real. Without her burqa, she has a beautiful soul, she is always smiling, and giving warm hugs. When I see her face, I see joy and warmth. However, when she put her buqa on, all that I just said about her was stripped away. I couldn't see her anymore. I couldn't see the same person. That really struck me hard. It reminded me of the "Under the Burqa" monologue I performed at the Vagina Monologues 2 years ago. It was just an eerie sight for me.

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Alf's blog

This blog from me is looong overdue. Warning, this is a long one so grab a pillow, some popcorn, and get comfortable. The last time we really got to "rest" was the 36 hour train ride from Bangalore to New Dehli. 36 hours...*gulp*...I really had no idea what to expect. When we got to the station, it smelled like one ginormous porta-potty. I later realized that it's because the bathrooms on the train (both Eastern and Western) had holes on the bottom which is where your business went out and onto the tracks. The car we rode was a sleeper car that could fit 8 people in a section and had no AC. No AC with the news that a heat wave was to hit Northern India, *gulp* We got through like brave soldiers. The funniest thing that happened was when Smitha threw her leftover dinner, veggie curry, out the window (no trashcans on the train, so passengers are to throw any waste out the window), she forgot to throw her food straight down while the train was moving fast. You can probably figure out what happened...as in where the food ended up.
To keep ourselves entertained, we played card games with some Indian guys that we befriended. In a game of Egyptian Rats, one of the Indian guys was getting playfully frustrated about losing each hand and started punching me in the arm and slapping the back of my head and my face...not all at once, but occasionally throughout the game. The fact that he slapped my face...not a gentle slap, I literally felt the bones in his fingers wake up the pain nerves in my face....I was shocked! Why would this Indian man slap an American woman's face that he just met? Over a game of cards? Wyatte and Bus looked at me in shock too. We didn't really know what to make of it, but we eventually found out that, that behavior is common as playful guesters.

There was a big difference between Bangalore and the villages we saw during our trip up. Mostly farms and slums. We saw people bathing in polluted puddles...I say puddles because the water level was so low considering how it used to be a big river. Shelter was made out of trash, tarp, dried vegetation. There's no concept of a land fill where there's one place for garbage...there's trash everywhere. The smell wasn't very pleasant, but its everywhere and you kind of have to get used to it.

When we finally got to New Dehli in our sweaty, 2 day old clothes, we all unanimously voted to find a flight back to Bangalore. We found a hotel with the help of a young man who was on his way home for the summer from college. Once we all showered and changed clothes, we checked out and went to Pizza Hut. I told myself that I wouldn't eat any American food during this trip, but after the train ride and some of us getting the big D, the doors opening to the smell of Pizza Hut pizza was like the gates of heaven. Later that evening, we all went to Vaibhav Kothari's house. Vai is currently an RIT student who grew up here in Dehli. When I talked with him, we hit it off really well. What really surprised me was that Vai had been to Fremont, CA and lived in the same housing complex that I live in now. When I first moved to Fremont to start my new job teaching at CSD, my neighbors mentioned to me about how a deaf guy who is Indian used to live there. Little did I know that I'd be flying half way around the world to meet him. Like I said in my last blog, this world is tiny! For those Fremontians who know Vai, he says HI!

Vai's family was really generous to us as they made dinner and socialized with us all evening. Their hospitality was much appreciated. Vai's family owns several successful business in Dehli and their home is beautiful with one of their office buildings next door that focus on designing and buliding dams. Their home is located in what you could call a "gated community". It's very different than what we have in America. There's a wall that surrounds the area with a military guard with a rifle. The walls had shards of broken glass cemented at the top to prevent trespassers from coming in. It almost looked like a concentration camp from the outside. Kinda scary.

Over the next two days, we took a rented bus to Agra to see the Taj Mahal and to Jaipur to see the "Pink City" which was actually more like a brownish-peach city. Seeing the Taj was neat, but it was pretty simple. I kind of expected to see something more elaborate. Despite the simple, beautiful, white marble structure, the reason for it's existance was moving. Would you build something as magnificent for the love of your life? In Jaipur, we did some shopping and visited an ancient fort that was high up on a hill. Guess what color it was?

We came back to Dehli late at night and had to use our tour book to find some last minute sleeping arrangements. There were only email addresses for 3 hotels in the book. We were able to make arrangements with Namaskar Hotel right across from the New Dehli station. It's not quite the safest part of town so we were very alert when walking over there. The hotel was down this really narrow and putrid-smelling alley. The first thing that came to mind when I saw the hotel was the movie "The Beach". The hotel reminded me of the hotel that Leonardo Di Caprio's character stayed in before he moved to the island in Thailand. The narrow hallways glowed a dim lime green, the doors were locked using pad locks, hot and mucky inside, just eerie. We were all a bit creeped out and considered moving to another hotel. We ended up settling there anyways because staying there was a safer option than walking out at night. When we all awoke the next morning, it was like we woke up to a different place. There were many other foreign travelers staying there and the creepy factor disappeared. At the end of the street is the main street that is filled with a gazillion vendors selling all kinds of things from clothes, accessories, henna tattoos, mostly touristy stuff. This street reminded many of us of Khao San Road in Thailand.

The location of our hotel turned out to be a coincidence because the NGO that we planned to visit was around the corner, the Dehli Foundation for Deaf Women. Once we stepped into their building, we saw that the women there spent their time making crafts that were displayed on the walls and used to sell. Their art work was on tapestries, leather, stationary. The room was filled with sewing machines, buckets of art supplies for painting and leatherwork. We were so taken aback by their craftswork that we started buying some of their work without any hesitation. After we all satisfied our shopping urge, we talked about GRO and the history of the women's organization. I really enjoyed myself as it seemed like we had met these women before. I still marvel at how fast and easy it is to befriend complete strangers from another country through our mutual understanding of Deaf Culture and use of sign language. One thing that surprised me is that the women who make the crafts/artwork for the organization get hardly enough money; 20 rupees a month. 20 rupees a month!? That's equivalent to 50 cents!

We stayed another night in Dehli, but it didn't last very long. The power went out and we were stuck in a mucky, hot room waiting until it was time to leave for our 645am flight back to Bangalore. Let me emphasize the word FLIGHT!! Yes! We found plane tickets back to Bangalore instead of taking another 36 hours back by train.

On the 19th, we had the opening ceremony at APD (All People with Disabilities, a school and facility that provides services and equipment for the disabled) to mark the beginning of our fieldwork with the Indian delegates. A hearing woman sang a prayer vocally to Saraswathi which is a goddess that they seek guidance to better education for the deaf. It was interesting to see a cultural ritual that they do, but it felt out of place because none of us could hear her and I didn't see the connection of that as to how the Indian people celebrate their Deaf Culture. Now I apologize if I make any misspellings with the names here because remembering these big names is brainwracking. Each of the directors and coordinators were introduced and gave a brief statement about what they do and their visions. Smitha was the only coordinator from the US. Hiramanth, the program coordinator for..............wants to, "combine Indian and American ideas" to help improve education for the deaf.
Anantadev Das, a well known leader in Bangalore's deaf community who founded SDD (Sanatana Dharma of the Deaf) and coordinator of our fieldwork program, talked about his background and history. He came to Gallaudet to give a lecture on religion and philosophy and that experience marked the beginning of his networking between the American and Indian deaf community.
Chandramouli, the coordinator for the Indian delegates mentioned that this is the first time in history that a program like this has happened here in India. It feels good knowing that I have the opportunity to be a part of it.
Kripa, the sign language cell coordinator at the Institute of Speech and Hearing talked about how she has been working hard to spread the awareness of sign language and to get sign language to be respected as a language despite the fact that different sign languages are used in different parts of India. Her biggest goal is to work hard to ensure that the language of instruction for the deaf is in ISL and ASL, not together but separately. That was a relief for me to hear that someone in the room understood that the use of two languages should not be mixed up, but rather used separately. I had studied and learned a lot about language acquisition during my masters program in Deaf Education and for me to witness a mixture of languages being used, its no surprise that confusion and miscommunication occurred often. Unfortunately, I found a comment that Kripa made about Smitha's speech to be a bit contradictory to what she said about avoiding the mixture of two languages. She commented on Smitha's method of communication (Total Communication) to be "signing in one box" and speaking in beautiful English and now she wants to see that more. Smitha was using ASL and English simultaneously, not separately. The reason why 2 languages should not be mixed is because neither language is produced fluently. Spoken English has to be modified to fit the structure of ASL and vice versa. It causes some gaps in the fluid production of both languages.

Overcoming the language barrier between 2 different nations will be the biggest challenge during this week. Even though we had 2 Indian interpreters who used a mixture of ASL and ISL, there were deaf participants who understand only Kannada. Kannada sign language has not been formally developed yet and these participants are just starting to learn English and ISL/ASL. I was somewhat bummed to find that the deaf community in Bangalore uses a mixture of ASL and ISL because I was hoping to become more immersed with learning ISL. It's quite easy for us American delegates to understand them, but for the Indian delegates, they're still acquiring ASL and with us not knowing many signs in ISL, making sure they understood us was a challenge.

Shri V. S. Basavaraj, the director of APD, said he is "all about change" and has been waiting for a moment like this to happen and that each one of us delegates, American and Indian, are considered to be role models for the deaf. He has a strong desire to change the way society sees people who have a disability, to see them as capable human beings just like everyone else.
Shri Rama Reddy, the director of the Department of Welfare of Disabilities and Senior Citizens, mentioned how deaf people face different issues than other people with disabilities due to the fact that we use a visual language.

On the 20th, we visited 3 local schools for the deaf. At Adarsh College, we met with a group of deaf college students and we had a discussion of what challenges they face at the school, mostly related to needing support services, interpreters (they only have 1), better notetakers, desire for direct instruction,etc. At RV Integrated School for the Disabled, which is an oral school, 50% of the day is spent in classes for deaf students and 50% of the day is spent in classes with their hearing peers. It was amazing to see that every child had hearing aids, even the old box with hard plastic molds model are still being used today. The last time I saw those kind of hearing aids was in '86.
While observing a math class where the younger students learn with their mothers, it was difficult for me to watch a deaf child guesturing to their mother and instead of receiving feedback that was visually accessible, the child's eyebrows crinkled down, eyes squinted, trying to make out the word that the mother was mouthing. It just looked really unnatural.
At the Sunaad Institute for Speech and Hearing, they teach some English and have a sign language class. We spent the afternoon learning some ISL and teaching some ASL and reciting ABC stories. Earlier at that school, I observed a class where the method of instruction is oral. Even though the teacher normally teaches maths/science/dance, he was teaching an audiotory training class where the kids were learning how to recognize high and low frequency sounds. The kids were sitting at their desks eager to impress us with recognizing the difference between a bell chime, a horn, a drum beat....I was in awe because not only was a student way off with her recognition, but the fact that it was obvious that no matter how many times she practiced this sound recognition, she probably will never be able to recognize the sound outside the classroom. The children looked like robots during that activity. In fact, the kids had already figured out who has the best hearing and would follow that kid. I also felt like a fool standing up in front of the classroom with the teacher talking to me really slowly, emphasizing each consonant expecting me to understand him. If only these kids could truly express how they feel doing this everyday......*sigh*

Oh! I forgot to mention, one of the highlights of the day was when Wyatte got hit by a cow on his buttocks! We were walking back to APD from ISH and there was a cow standing on the sidewalk. The cows here are considered sacred and are free to roam around as they like. Right when Wyatte passed the cow, it swung its head real hard and whacked him on his butt. Wyatte's face expression was permanant for the rest of the day.

On the 21st, yesterday, we stayed in at APD and had a workshop on Leadership, Deaf Rights, and prepared a workshop on Teamwork that we're going to do today at the Sheila Kolatta School for the Deaf (SKID). We all learned a new outdoor game called Koko, which is a mixture of baseball, bowling, and dodge ball. The object of the game is to knock a tower of rocks down with a ball and rebuild it without getting hit by the ball by the other team. It was a lot of fun! We just came back from visiting the Amruthavani Kannada School for the Hearing Impaired. It's a free school that was founded by a teacher who used to work at SKID. On the way to AKSHI, we had to cross a railroad track and the train was coming as some of us were crossing it. Smitha, Wyatte, and Chandramouli were behind and ran to try to cross the tracks before the train passed. Chandramouli didn't feel like he was gonna make it and tried to stop Smitha and Wyatte, but his eyes widened with surprise when he saw Smitha and Wyatte determined to cross and quickly followed. It was insane! Not only that, but the train choo-chooed right by where we were and released thick, black exhaust from the engine car. We all ran for cover and covered our face. You couldn't see anyone in front of you.

What's next?

Alf
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Day three by kt

Today was very relaxing as we just stayed at the APD and did workshops.

I was really amazed by how all of the delegates came together by the end of the day. At the beginning, there were numerous communication barriers and lots of interpreting and translating going on. We all had to practice a lot of patience on everyone's part and it helped when we made things more visual via short skits and examples.

I know that in Jaipur, some members of team one tried to teach me some ISL, but I'm the kind of person that learns best through doing. So, I didn't really remember nor use any of the signs taught to me.

However, at the end of today, I could see the Indian delegates using signs that they had picked up from us and the American delegates (myself included) using a lot of ISL. I also was happy to see the Indian girls become more assertive when they didn't understand something or wanted someone to move in order to see them better. Actually, that statement applies to all of the Indian delegates.

I was reviewing the video at the end of the day to label everything and I was intrigued by the transformation that occurred in our group in the course of one day. We all went from being shy and reserved to the end of the evening when we all socialized way past the end of the workshops. We compared dance moves, Tamer cut a rug with Bus, and Wyatte and Alf learned a dance move or two from the Indian delegates.

One of the Indian delegates also decided to regale us all with a retelling of the tale regarding a certain blogger's, one who shall remain nameless, incident with the cow on the streets of Bangalore yesterday.

I think we are all getting much more comfortable with one another and I am glad for that since we start giving workshops to high school students tomorrow!

The food at the school is so delicious, I can't get over it. I asked Smitha why the foods at the restaurants weren't like this, because I was really starting to detest Indian food from our not-so-good restaurant experiences. To which I got a reply of, "Honey, because it is homemade, that's why!"

I am also in love with fresh fruit juices. I was apprehensive to the idea of fruits at first based on warnings from everyone. I tested the waters with some sugardane in Goa, not too crazy about it. Nor was I fond of the sugardane juice that we had in Mysore. We also tried jackfruit in Halebid, which wasn't so bad despite smelling like unwashed feet. I am, however, in love with the pineapple juice here.

What else? The weather here has been extremely forgiving as of late. Lots of cool days and short rainstorms. No complaints here! It's nice walking to the APD in the mornings from the Don Basco Provincial Saletarian house, just go down Milton Road, hang a right on Davis street, then an immediate left on Hutchins and take that to past 5th Cross Hutchins road and go left past the Mini Bazarr store. The APD itself is a tranquil place I think. When we went out to the playground to play 7 Stones, an Indian game, a cute little boy came up and grabbed my hand and wanted his picture taken. Then he came up and held my hand again when Chandru was explaining the rules of the game.

That game is better than cricket, IMO. Albeit, a bit violent, haha. On that note, I should get some sleep. Good night/morning all!
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India v/s India: quoted by kt

This was recently published in The Times of India and I thought it would be worthwhile to share here.

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There are two Indias in this country.

One India is straining at the leash, eager to spring forth and live up to all the adjectives that the world has been showering recently upon us.

The other India is the leash.

One India says, give me a chance and I'll prove myself. The other India says, prove yourself first and maybe then you'll have a chance.

One India lives in the optimism of our hearts. The other India lurks in the skepticism of our minds.



One India wants. The other India hopes.

One India leads. The other India follows.



But conversions are on the rise. With each passing day more and more people from the other India have been coming over to this side.

And quietly, while the world is not looking, a pulsating, dynamic new India is emerging.

An India whose faith in success is far greater than its fear of failure. An India that no longer boycotts foreign-made goods but buys out the companies that make them instead.

History, they say, is a bad motorist. It rarely ever signals its intentions when it is taking a turn.

This is that rarely-ever moment. History is turning a page.

For more than half a century, our nation has sprung, stumbled, run, fallen, rolled over, got up, dusted herself and cantreed, sometimes lurched on. But today, as we begin our 60th year as a free nation, the ride has brought us to the edge of time's great precipice.

And one India - a tiny little voice at the back of the head - is looking down at the bottom of the ravine and hesitating.

The other India is looking up at the sky and saying, it's time to fly.
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Days 1 and 2 by kt

I will try and keep this short since my last entry was long and the other bloggers will blog about this as well.

Our opening ceremony was on Tuesday June 19th. This served as the official kick off for the camp, and I was surprised at the number of people in attendance. Speeches were given on the importance of this empowerment and leadership development camp, and GRO's mission. All of the delegates were given red roses in an arrangement of baby breath flowers, as well as a book of Indian fairy tales, we were touched by that.

We were all finally able to meet our Indian delegates at last! They are the peers that we will be working with for the next week or so.

Communication proved to be challenging right off the bat, with some of the delegates knowing little English, and us knowing no Kannada at all. The different modes of sign language used was a challenge as well, Indian Sign Language (ISL), and American Sign Language (ASL), as well as bits and pieces of British Sign Language (BSL) thrown in for good measure. We were able to overcome that and learn each other's names as well as engage in a few ice breaker activities to get to know one another better. I'm excited about this group of people and I look forward to seeing what we accomplish by the end of this delegation.

Day two started with an ambitious goal to visit six deaf schools. However, Bangalore traffic and Deaf Indian Standard Time, as we now call it, threw a wrench in our plans.

Neverless, we were able to visit a college that has deaf students and only one interpreter. She is a CODA, a child of a deaf adult. However, she was only willing to sign for the students, she refuses to voice for them. For, in her own form of empowerment, she believes that they can communicate and speak for themselves. I never thought of it in that way before. During our question and answer session, the students expressed frustration at only having one interpreter amongst about a dozen students. Additionally, they are frustrated with a lack of tutoring support, as well as access issues. They all expressed a desire to eliminate the interpreter, to have total access to communication via a deaf teacher or a teacher that could sign.

I kept thinking all day about how lucky we are in America.

After leaving, we went to the RV institute, which is an oral school. Allow me comment on something interesting that I have observed: even though India is an oral country at large, I have yet to meet anyone against sign language. I think that this attitude is quite different from America. The common statement is that they are not against sign language, they just don't know how to sign, nor do they have the resources to implement a sign-language based approach to education.

Another thing that I have noticed is that the schools really push parental involvement and they really view parents as partners in the education of deaf children.

When we first arrived at this particular school, we were mobbed. I kid you not, the kids were like paparazzi! They all clamored for their pictures to be taken, to see the videocamera, and they kept grabbing at us and our equipment. I had to keep taking baby steps as to not step on or hurt any of the kids, and I basically moved with a gaggle of kids surrounding me at all times. The hearing kids were in yellow shirts and navy blue pants, while the deaf kids were smartly dressed in white smocks with blue accents. The hearing kids mobbed us too and overcrowded the deaf kids.

Everyone kept coming up to shake our hands, I started feeling embarrassed and self conscious after awhile because it was pretty overwhelming. Even when summoned to go back inside the building at the end of lunch, they crowded the balconies of the classrooms and continued to wave at us. Some of the girls swooned over the boys, and the few stragglers that stayed behind to talk to us were treated to an angry schoolmarm that chased after them smacking them and telling them to get to class.

We, the not-so-famous-anymore members of the Monsoon Riders, made our way inside the building to be greeted by an assembly of students and staff. The principal explained a little bit about the history of the school and the philosophy as well. Some shoving matches broke out in the crowd because most of the kids were craning to see Smitha, who was interpreting for the delegates. That was hard to see and I do wonder how much things would change once ISL is fully established and implemented.

We broke tò go back to the APD (Association for People with Disabilities) for lunch. It was honestly the best meal that I've had in India and I don't even know what we ate but I will find out! We visited our final school of the day, the Sunaad Kannada School for Hearing Impaired. We observed a few classes, and played with some of the kids. We also got together on the top floor to get a crash course in ISL from the school's sign language teacher. We also had a lot of fun sharing ABC stories, comparing ISL and ASL signs, doing skits, etc.

We headed back to the APD, and planned to do more workshops, but DIST rides again and that didn't happen. We did get to share our highs and lows of the day, as well as sneak in a session of mediation. None of the Indian delegates could name a low to the day. We were all naming the rain, the traffic, the time issue, and they all said there were no lows for them.

Sorry for another long entry, but you guys are caught up now and I will try to get better about blogging in a more timely manner!
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The golden triangle by kt

Wyatte said this morning that he thought we were all growing up a lot on this trip and it is true. When we met up with team one, I could see subtle changes in some people. It was really good to meet up.

First, our team met up at Pizza Hut because we were starving after our train ride and in need of some familiar food. The plan was to split up, exchange our money, go to the bank/ATM, and all that jazz before meeting up at the restaurant. We split up into 3 groups, the first 2 groups got to Pizza Hut just fine. Smitha and Tamer got a wee bit lost and we had fun chiding them for that. Especially since we suggested just meeting at Vai's house and they were hesistant to do that because they were afraid we would get lost.

Ironically enough, we arrived on time, they got lost again and arrived a hour later, and team two arrived 2 hours later due to traffic and transportation issues. What can I say? We are quickly learning the concept of Indian Standard Time, which is almost worse than Deaf Standard Time. When you combine the two, forget it lol.

Once we all were under one roof, we exchanged greetings and proceeded to enjoy a delicious Indian meal courtesy of Vai's family. They were all very generous and kept offering dish after dish even though our tummies were already filled to the brim. The samosas were delicious as well as were the various dishes that I cannot recall the names of at the moment. We enjoyed spending time at the house, looking through the wedding albums, discussing the upcoming wedding of another cousin in Jaipur (Bharat's twin, I believe), and just interacting with the family. Their coffee is also to die for and I don't even like coffee.

At 1am, we all boarded an air conditioned bus for our trip to Agra. Mission: to see the sun rise over the Taj Mahal. Successful? Negative. We did get there after sunrise though, DST and IST! I can't even begin to describe the Taj. It was just majestic, made from cool, slightly transculent, white marble, it is truly a wonder of the world and I'm glad that I got to see it as well as the other members of both teams. I was surprised that it was covered with red fortlike walls and flanked by mosques as well. I also kept seeing Stars of Davids. The place was crawling with monkeys, there were even mama monkeys carrying babies on their stomachs. That would be monkey babies, not human babies, just to clarify. The Taj had only 3 monkeys inside though and someone said that they're specially trained to keep the other monkeys out, I don't know if that's true or not.

After the Taj, we began our bumpy ride to Jaipur, and we all came to hate the AC after it wouldn't stop dripping on us. The Golden Triangle is in the desert and consequently, it was very hot and humid. Jaipur seemed to be in the mountains and is also known as the pink city. It is well known for the shopping and cultural events that it possesses. My favorite part was hotel OM tower, which is a 5-star hotel owned by Vai's brother, Vikas. We were actually able to shower in a tub, with a shower curtain, with hot water, and without the use of buckets. The beds were very comfortable, and the views from our windows were beautiful. Both teams were able to stay there thanks to the generosity of the family. That night, we split up to do some shopping. Negotiating was tiring, so we headed back to the hotel and ate dinner at the revolving restaurant at the top of the tower, more on that later. It seemed like nothing at first, but then we all started feeling a bit disoriented and vertigo- like. Afterwards, we all met at the rooftop pub, Amigos, for drinks among... well, amigos. We were also able to meet Vikas for the first time.

The next day brought about plans to meet for breakfast at 8, which many of us opted to skip. The beds were THAT comfortable. Most went to see the Amer fort, but unfortunately I missed that. I wasn't too bummed though because I got a chance to catch up and have lunch with Greg at McDonald's, and when we returned and sat around in the lobby waiting for everyone to return, Vikas asked us to come up to his office for a chat. I had fun doing just that. Seriously though people, here is a deaf business owner in another country, a successful one to boot. That is an accomplishment and proof that one can do whatever they aim to do if they set their mind to it.

The Business part of me was intrigued and I asked questions about the hotel, the design, communication with the staff, etc. Apparently, the revolving restaurant design was inspired by the grandparents' visit to Niagara Falls. Small world. I also remarked how the hotel employees all seemed so deaf friendly and most knew a bit of sign, additionally most weren't afraid to whip out paper and pencil if needed. I wish we saw that in more places!

What followed was a hurry to get on the road, we actually said goodbye to some of the members of team one as the bus was slowing rolling into traffic with us half on it. DJ, Avi, Greg, and Anthony all decided to stay in Jaipur longer, while the rest of us completed the last leg of the Golden Triangle.

The bus ride was very bumpy and all of us were propelled out of our seats at one time or another. Sleep was impossible. Soon, our conversation turned to ghosts and our encounters with the paranormal, a conversation that I regretted having later due to it putting my nerves on edge. First, we dropped Alim off at the airport and said goodbye as the bus was rolling away in a hurry. Then due to the narrow streets in Delhi, we had to be dropped off in the middle of an area that was really... Wow.

The first thing I noticed was the lack of women and the increased amount of staring. We were also followed on one occasion or two and a guy actually had the nerve to inappropriately touch a girl in one of our groups before running off laughing with his friends.

We were all more than relieved when we finally reached Hotel Namaske! Ok, after our comfortable stay at OM tower, this was a huge downgrade even though it wasn't that bad. It was just a bit seedy and a return to showering with buckets and no water pressure.

While checking in, I saw a mama dog and her baby puppy playing in the alley that the hotel was situated at, and well, I am a sucker for puppies. I ignored Smitha's warnings about the dogs in India and approached them. They were so friendly and attention-starved, they kept jumping on me and playing with me and tugging on the cords of my shorts and my bracelets. I would have taken both home if I could have, seriously.

The next morning revealed a whole 'nother side to the area when the shops opened. We were in heaven, Smitha compared it to Kako San road in Thailand, and I apologize if I just butchered the spelling of that road. Unfortunately, Lizzie and Kenny were unable to join us having left that morning for London.

First, we visited a deaf women's organizaton that was right by our hotel. We bought them out, I think. We were really impressed with their crafts and their handiwork, as well as their strength and determination in running a business in a male dominated society. So, we were more than happy to do our shopping there and spend our money there as well, and they seemed thrilled to meet us and talk with us.

After a lunch at Pizza Hut, we split up to do some shopping. At 7:30, a meet-up at the hotel led to a send-off for the rest of group one. So, we hiked to the nearest taxi stand with all of their backpacks amidst the still-full Main Street Bazarr. Luckily, our hotel was right by the train station, so we secured India's version of a van, loaded up people, shed a few tears and waved goodbye.

Then, bam! A display of Indian drivers at their best when an auto rickshaw drove into the van as it was backing up. What we did not expect was the scene that occurred afterwards with Tamer having to break up a near-fight. Oy vey.

The excitement did not end there! We met up with Smitha and Alf and went to grab dinner. We gave feedback on the reunion between team 1 and 2, then headed back to the hotel to continue our meeting. I saw the two dogs again and they remembered me, so I played with them until Alf came out and told me that she just saw them playing in a public urinal not far from the hotel.

I decided to heed Smitha's warnings about dogs in India and proceeded to wash my hands in scalding hot water, or rather, the hotel's version of scalding hot water: barely-lukewarm water accompanied with lots of hand sanitizer.

The power decided to go out, then the generator decided to stop working, then the wind decided to get very calm. It grew very hot and we all had yet to sleep and pack for our flight back.

We survived though! We all agreed that a 3 hour flight beats 35 hours on a train any day! At the airport, a dog kept stepping on my flip flops and was begging for attention, and I couldn't resist. Neither could Tamer. I'm glad to know that I'm not the only dog person in the group, and the dogs in India aren't all that bad. Some are pretty cute :)

Sorry for the long entry. I've actually been writing this for a week now, I can never find time to actually finish and post it. We, the bloggers, also owe updates about the first two days of our workshops. Until then, farewell from the Don Bosco house!
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And for the time being, we shall refrain from trains.

Greetings from a very tired group that sits in a hotel that we got solely to shower and change clothes. It is now 2PM on Friday June 15th, I feel as if I have lost track of time. We left Wednesday evening around 7PM for New Delhi. What followed was an unforgettable 35 hours. If you want to get to know someone well, spend time together on a train. :)

The heat made all of our electronic devices die an early death. No blackberries, no iPods, no personal space. Let me back up.

We somehow got separated into 2 sections and we wanted to sit together to be able to easily communicate, so we tried negotiating with the people in both sections to switch. One section had older people who preferred to sleep on the lower berths so we couldn't begrudge them that. The other section had people who were... closely related to the anal region of the human body to put it mildly. Not only did they refuse, but they began to laugh at us and mock us.

Smitha and I worked hard talking to the porters and the military police to explain our situation. A young'un the age of 18 took interest in our plight and also began to advocate on our behalf. The rude men were convinced to an even trade of seats in a different section, and they surprisingly came up to us and shook our hands after the switch. Interesting.

And we gained a new friend. He often came over to our section to chat with us during our ride. Another friend that we made was Samir from Kashmir. At first, it was fun getting to know them and chatting and they seemed very interested in us and sign language as well as GRO. However, when we began to grow tired, sweaty, sticky, and hot, we got slightly annoyed at their insistence of cramming 4 or 5 people in a seat designed for 3. I guess we are all still getting used to to the whole difference in personal space. I am happy that we made some brew friends, we also met a little 12 year old boy who was from Tibet. He has speech problems, so he knew some BSL from a disabled school that he attended, consquently' he was fascinated with our signing.

Sleeping was an experience in itself, Bus, Wyatte, and I learned our lesson from our Bangalore train ride and we brought blankets this time. They almost weeby necessary though because the ride was so hot, punctuated only by brief spells of rain. Needless to say, we all feel like survivors.

We are treating ourselves at Pizza Hut before Vai's dinner at 7. They don't have any meatlover's though, wow, I never thought I would be the first to say that I miss meat, especially beef.

I bid you all a fond adieu for now.
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And our team name has meaning by kt

I seriously cannot get over the deaf kids here in India! Before leaving Mysore, we visited the Government school for the deaf. We arrived before school started so we were able to engage in games with the children.

Alf, Wyatte and Chandru (our deaf Indian coordinator who is helping take care of things on this end) organized a game of cricket. Ganesh had a GRO moment where he gave a beach ball to a group of kids. Then he and Abi taught the kids how to play a game called Steal the Bacon. Meanwhile, Smitha and Bus taught the American version of the elephant game.

As for me, I walked around filming everything and noticed a boy who had been following me from the very start, he was not interested in any of the games, only the videocamera. So, I gave it to him and taught him how to use it then he helped me film some of the games. .::melt::. Little kids are so cute. I think we were all more impressed with this school because of their use of sign language, but the facilities... Wow. The games we played were in the weeds, amidst piles of rusty rebars and deadwood.

After school started, we observed a couple classes, the first thing we noticed was the lack of girls. It is simply too dangerous in the area, plus there are no dormitories provided. There was no electricity nor lights, it was dim in the classroom, the teachers did not sign that great and taught in another language.

Despite all of this, talk about motivation. The kids all paid attention, helped with erasing the board, sat patiently in their seats when one of the teachers was late and rose in unison to greet her when she arrived out of respect. I saw no complaints nor expectations of pity, only happiness.

On the way back to Bangalore, all 10 of us were cramped in a tiny car and stuck in traffic to boot, so Chandru struck up conversation with me that really made me think. He asked me if he could talk with me about something and asked what I planned to do. That caught me off guard and I admitted that I honestly didn't know where to even begin addressing all of these issues that deaf people face here in India. He then more or less asked if I planned to do something and explained how foreigners tend to come and go but the problems remain and their help, while appreciated, is often short-lived and not enough.

It is easy to read what I have just said above as ungrateful, but please don't take it that way for what I saw in the backseat of that tiny TATA was frustration. I saw someone who truly loved India and someone that wanted his deaf son to get the basic necessities to succeed in life such as educational access, interpreters, Indians who understand, a government that helps, and people from the outside who love India as well.

We brainstormed together as to what could be done. It seems like a sign language system needs to be established, taught, and accepted. A school with dormitories would be nice, updated technologies at the schools as well, we even discussed the logistics of distance learning and online learning as well as bilingualism in order to preserve communication between parent and child.

I hope that each and every one of us go back to America with a newfound appreciation of life and a commitment to continue our work long after we leave.

Before I close, the explanation behind my title. Before we left Mysore, it poured. I have never seen rain like this, the streets became flowing rivers of mud, schoolchildren took off their shoes and splashed in the puddles on their way home. Indians took cover under whatever they could find, cows looked very annoyed. And the Monsoon Riders hurried back to the aunt's house, changed clothes, went outside, and played. Who says you can't be a kid again? :-D
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Dry land riders by kt

Where to begin? The past few days have been such a whirlwind of traveling that I have a hard time absorbing everything sometimes because it is a nonstop barrage of all 5 senses simultaneously. The honking of all the cars stuck in traffic, the smells of exhaust mingled with food cooking at the various roadside stands, the taste of Indian spices, and the sticky feel that everything has due to the heat and humidity.

The other day, we went to Belur/Halebid to see the temples. It was amazing to see structures that have stood the test of time and maintained its integrity as well. I couldn't get over all the intricately carved homages to various deities. The highlight of the day was definitely the temple with 1000 steps (actually more like 661, but for the sake of argument, we will say 1000 because it felt like we climbed that many steps). It was basically a mountain with stairs to put it plain and simple and it wasn't an easy climb, but the view was worth it. At the top we were greeted with a temple and a larger than life statute that just might give Michaelangelo's David a run for its money.

The lowlight of the day? Definitely the driving and the traffic. I admit a slight bias here since I easily become carsick.

The next morning brought us yet another long car ride to Mysore, which is where we are as we speak. Smitha has relatives in every city, which comes in handy because her family really does take care of us and they pamper us as well!

We went to the palace at night and arrived in time to see the lights being turned off. Do Do? Laugh.

Dawn (ok, I exaggerate on the time a wee bit) brought us to the kitchen of Smitha's aunt Sashi, where we were not allowed to leave without a proper breakfast! They really do pamper us I'm telling ya!

We headed off to our first stop of the day: the All India Institute of Speech and Hearing - AIISH. We had quite a nice chat with the director, and I plan to write a separate entry about that later, so hold that thought. Afterwards, we toured the grounds and the campus with Shivakumar and Pavithra as our guides. We saw quite a few deaf children, none signed. We also saw hearing impaired classes being taught in English and Kannada, which is a language used here in southern India. There were classes being taught in some other languages too. I fail to remember the names at the moment though.

Next, we went to my favorite place of the whole day: the Rotary Club school for deaf infants and mothers. I'm an education major so I kept looking at the different ways they educate children here, and that place really got to me. Maybe because it was full of cute little deaf kids, maybe because most of the mothers were there with them and actually serve as their teachers, or maybe it was the way all of the kids crowded around me to see themselves on camera when I flipped the LCD viewfinder to face them, I don't know what it was, but the place got to me.

I felt conflicted. It's an oral school and I could see some of the kids gesturing and some of the kids struggling to understand speech, and the adults sometime used physical force to force the kids to speak orally with us. Meanwhile, there we all were, signing away and having the best of both worlds. It really does make me more grateful to my parents, if that's even possible, because I'm already very grateful as it is.

After that, we went to the J.S.S. Polytechnic Institute, unfortunately, most of the students were on holiday. We did get to meet some teachers and some hearing students who knew sign as well as some deaf students. This is where our two guides attend school.

It was certainly a long day but it was topped off by a visit to the KSM dam. We stayed there for a couple hours just walking around the Brindavan Garden and sightseeing the dam as well as the gardens. Once it became dark, we crossed the river to see the musical fountain.

Before I end this blog entry, I want to talk about the cows, yes, the cows. I saw one wearing a gold necklace today, I kid you not. While in Goa on the motobike, Wy and I passed a sign for a proposed cattle pound. Little old egocentric me did not get that at first until I compared it to a dog pound, a place for unwanted cows. Interesting. Cows are really sacred here and they're everywhere. It was a bit unusual to see cows among city traffic at first, but I've gotten used to it. They also have the ultimate right of way, traffic comes to a standstill when a cow crosses the street. We saw a lot of bulls today with painted horns. Their sizes range from small and doglike to the huge imposing beasts that we are accustomed to in America. Some are so thin that you can see every bone in their body and some are so fat that they look like they're ready to topple over at any moment. I still am a bit bothered when I see them tied to street signs inches away from traffic with hardly any room to even move, much less than lie down.

I shall end this for now as we are at the Nithyothsav hotel surrounded by waitstaff and about to eat. Ciao for now!
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Alf's blog.

I arrived on Thursday, June 7th and was the last person to arrive. I actually had a pleasant flight, yes, call me crazy. I was lucky to bump into another deaf woman on my flight, Michele Friedner, a PhD student at Berkeley. She's been doing research on deaf people in India and is actually going to be working with us during our field work with the other Indian GRO delegates. Small world!!

Friday, June 8th was our first day as team Monsoon Riders. We spent the morning having breakfast at a local restaurant with the coordinator for the Indian GRO program, Anantadev Das and the Mouli family. It was soooo nice to finally have my first Indian meal in India! For those who don't know, when it comes to Indian food, it can be dangerous for me. Not because of the fact that most Indian cuisines are spicy, but because I tend to eat more than I can handle. It's too good!! Masala this, masala that, dosas, and best of all, Indian coffee!!!! I think my team can vouch me on the coffee part, especially when Smitha's aunt makes it.

After breakfast, we spent the rest of the day doing a team building activity similar to the reality TV show "Amazing Race". We were paired up with a partner and told to visit 10 different places around Bangalore, find a few facts about each location, and take a Jump Picture at each location.
**Jump Picture = one or both teammates being photographed whie jumping in the air.**

Once we were discharged from the starting location, each team took off. By the time my partner, Bus and I arrived to the end of the street, we looked around to see where everyone else was at. True biz, without anyone really saying anything, the other two teams, Bus, and I telepathically decided to break the unspoken rule of not working with the other teams and embarked on the Amazing Race journey together. We looked at our locations, bought a map, and went to Lakeview, a small eatery , to map out our route. Some of us had eaten here before and highly recommended the vanilla icecream with fresh mango. After double checking on my teammate's stomach status after eating that, I got the okay and ordered it. It was really delicious, but still wondered how it would treat my stomach.

It took us quite a while to find the first place we picked which was the Vidhana Soudha, the central Government building where Smitha's mother used to work as a lawyer before moving to the states. We walked for what seemed like an hour to get there since the map we had only named the major streets, the locals we asked kept pointing us in different directions, and several auto drivers kept lying to us on how far it was in hopes to trick us into being overcharged. Autos are small taxis that look like 3-wheeled motorcycles with a covered back seat that can fit up to 3 people. Since we were foreigners, we often find it difficult to get a reasonable fare or a metered ride.

After leaving the Vidhana Soudha, many of us were exhausted and had achey stomachs includng myself. Dang that mango!!!! We wanted to speed up our route so we decided to pick up 2 autos and have them take us to each one of our destinations for 600 rupees. It worked out sooo well and we were relieved to get off our feet. However, on the last part of our route, the drivers decided to try to outsmart us into getting commission by telling us that we should visit a shopping center on the way back and when we declined, they tried to increase our fare by 400 rupees. We got a little annoyed as they wouldn't stay with our original offer so we just told them to drop us off at our ending location, the Forum, a really nice contemporary mall. Once we got there, we paid them the original 600 rupees and took off without looking back. Some of us kind of laughed feeling guilty as if we just "dined and dashed", but we were glad to stick with our plan and be cautious about getting ripped off.

During dinner at the Forum, we all talked about our lows and highs of the day. Some of us said that the lowest part of the day was getting stomach aches and not feeling well. Luckily, for most of us, we all felt better and back to our normal, crazy, fun, loving selves by the time we had dinner. Most of us commented that our high of the day was working together as a team of 6 even though we were "supposed" to work in pairs and taking Jump Pictures at the Glass House with some Indian kids. The kids were really cute when they wanted to take a Jump Picture with us, but 3 kids turned into 6 kids and from there the number of kids grew exponentially. We had to leave before we became stuck in a stampede of kids. Still cute though :)

Yesterday on Saturday, June 9th, we all got up at the crack of dawn and left the hotel to embark on a 5 hour van ride to see 3 temples (Halebid, Belur's Chennakeshava temple and Shravanabelagola),
Smitha's cousin, Anju and the Mouli family joined us. We had a pretty wild time on the bus to kill time, playing games and listening to Indian music.
At the temples, we couldn't wear shoes on the premises so we walked around on flaming hot stones as if we were being tossed around like hot potatoes. Inside and outside the temples, there were religious stories carved into stone that were beatuiful and detailed. I think we can all agree that we liked the Shravanabelagola temple with 1,000 steps because it was a good workout and the view was spectacular. Yes, that's what they say...1,000 steps from the bottom to the top of the temple, but we actually only counted 661 steps.

Right now, it's Sunday, June 10th and we're playing "Let's see how many people you can fit in a standard-sized jeep" with bags!! Yep, we managed to squeeze 10 of us with some bags in the jeep and we're en route to Mysore.

More later!!
Alf
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The southwest via north by northwest: Getting the hang of Bang-guh-lawr by KT

My apologies again for not identifying myself in my last post.

We spent the first day in Bangalore sleeping at the Panjwal Lodge of the Hotel Nadini. It was 175 rupees per person per night for one of the not-the-greatest rooms of the trip (compared to the 100 rupees we each spent in Goa for one of the best rooms of the trip). I woke up at 2am very confused because it was so bright in the room that it felt like it was 2PM. We finally figured out that the walls didn't go all the way up to the ceiling and it was the hall light spilling into our room that made it so bright. After Wyatte opened the door and turned out all the lights, the room was pitch black, just how I like it. Then I noticed that I could see stars on the ceiling, I thought to myself that surely the ceiling couldn't be open to the elements as well! It turns out that it was just stars and planets painted on with glow in the dark paint, charming.

People here stare a lot more. Especially the men when it comes to certain assets that I possess if you get my drift. It is almost impossible to eat a meal without being surrounded by at least 3 to 5 waitstaff standing right by you.

Smitha and her aunt came to pick us up and we went to their house. Let me tell you, it is nice to be in a family home once again, it just feels comfortable. We are finally able to relax, and we all feel full for the first time in a week. Rathni and JS continually ask us if we are hungry or thirsty. She makes a good cup of coffee too. JS took us to the Nallapa restaurant where we ate jolada rotti oota. That is a meal eaten on a banana leaf with different servings of beans and vegetables that you scoop up with naan. Think of it as using a tortilla to scoop up and eat your food with in the absence of silverware. Apparently, Nalla was a king who liked to gamble and bet everything that he had, including his wife. He ended up losing everything, so he decided to become a cook and became a famous cook in Bangalore, so the restaurant was named in his honor.

After Anjun, Smitha's cousin, got off of work, we all rented a van for what was supposed to be 4 hours (but ended up being 6) and headed to MG Road and Brigade street. We checked out some stores before meeting up with Amit, NP, Gowroo, and her husband, whose name escapes me at the moment. Once we all verified that the ice cream here was indeed made from cow milk, we all delighted over delicious vanilla ice cream served with diced mangoes. Definitely the perfect way to escape the heat even if it is cooler here compared with Mumbai.

After chatting with our newfound deaf friends in India, we headed to the Forum. The Forum, according to the Uncle JS, is a mall that will make you feel like you are in America again and he was right. It was luxurious, there were security guards on every floor of the parking garage, and there was a man whose job was to stand at the ticket machine, push the button, take the ticket out, and hand it to each driver entering the garage even though the machine stands mere inches from the car.

Each elevator has an attendant and ours quickly whisked us down one floor to a pub called. Sahib Sindh Sultan where Amit and NP met us. Talk about a British style, non-smoke free pub! Nontheless, we had a lot of fun. The traffic here is reminiscient of mumbai though and it took us forever to get back and we were all quite best when we finally hit the sack.

The rest of our group comes today, can't wait!
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A Tale of Two Cities - by Wyatte

In the span of a week, I feel as if I've experinced two Indias. Mumbai and Bangalore stand in stark contrast to each other in pretty much every aspect you could think of.

When we first arrived in Mumbai, the oppressive heat, extreme poverty and "pungent odors" were noticed. The sheer amount of people packed in the streets and buildings evoked a sense of claustrophobia that I would consider worse than New York City. Much like NYC, Mumbai has its beautiful side with the Gateway to India, the Taj, Victoria Terminus and Mumbai University Library.

I asked my fellow people to describe Mumbai in one word. This was their responses:

"Cultured"

"Stuck"

"Maze"

"Jewel"

As much as I noticed Mumbai for all those negative things, I noticed the lack thereof when we arrived in Bangalore. There are hardly any poor people begging on the streets, people are more friendly and in general, the cleanliness is much better. The moderness of the city is also not lost upopn us and although we have barely touched the surface, you can tell the difference right away. One thing we have especially noticed here is that they stare a lot more, especially at Katie who as of right now is still the only female with us.

Their one word responses describing Bangalore:

"Amazing"

"Modern"

"Home"

"Eyes"

I will update later and see if these first impressions hold up over the next month as we experince more of Bangalore and other cities like Delhi.
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Bangalore at last!

Trains at night definitely make the time go by faster. I think we were all surprised at how cold we became at night though. I am sure that we were quite the comical sight when we all covered up with our little towels. Blankets are something that nobody thought to pack, except Tamer.

Bus, Tamer, and I all got the upper berth (think of it as the top bunk) at the end of sleeper car number 8. About a hour into the journey, Tamer noticed that there was a man hanging on the outside of the door leading into the car. Apparently he wasn't the only one that noticed, for it wasn't long before a nun in grey habit led two soldiers to the sight.

The soldiers opened the door and with the aid of another man on the train, attempted to pull the guy in. However, he was refusing to let go of the bar outside the door and they were having a hard time getting him into the car itself. I didn't understand why the guy was fighting them, but I quickly understood why.

Once they pulled him in, the two military officers and the man who had helped them began to slap, hit, kick, and stomp on the guy who was on the floor at this point. They even took turns whipping him with a bamboo stick.

Then they began throwing water on him and finally let up. They turned away the nuns that tried to intervene, and smiled at us since we were right there less than 10 feet away and could feel the blows being landed. They kept saying, "it's ok, go to sleep, it's ok."

Then later on, they all started interacting with the guy and being more patient with him. He was obviously either mentally ill or under the influence of something, I think the latter. One of the soldiers gingerly touched his face, which was now swelling up, and gestured that he was holding onto the bar and how he was refusing to let go. Another soldier helped to straighten up his shirt and fix his hair.

It was just bizarre to see them beating this man and then being gentle with him. Almost redemptive, I suppose. Bus said that in many countries, whippings are a form of positive discipline.

We had an interesting taxi ride from the train station to our hotel.

Following Smitha's advice, we decided to stay at the Panjwall Lodge of Hotel Nadini. Her cousin explained where it was at and how to get there, so we took off after giving instructions to the drivers. The drivers suddenly claimed not to know where it was at, and took us to a different hotel, the Mahkil Regency or something like that. When we went in with them to check the price, it was something like 1300 rupees per person per night. It was obvious the drivers knew the clerk and were working for a commission. We piled back into the taxi and again instructed them to take us to the hotel that we originally wanted.

They pulled up tò a different hotel, blatantly ignoring our request. Bus refused to get out of the taxi, so we all stayed in, and I told them, "Listen! We want OUR hotel, not your hotel, OUR hotel!"

They agreed and drove us around some more, we were all quite annoyed at this point. They kept slowing down in front of different hotels, so finally Tamer was like just drop is off at the boot store and we will find it ourselves.

The drivers then, miracles of all miracles, "found the hotel". So, we all got out and paid 50 rupees each, the drivers tried to say that it was more money due to driving us around to different hotels. I laughed at the nerve and told them that we did not ask them to do so, so that was their fault for doing that!

After forcing them to take the 200 rupees we'd only pay or leave it, Wyatte said he saw them laughing when we walked off as if to say, "Darn, it didn't work!"

Fortunately, that type of experience has not been common during our trip this far.
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enroute to Silicon Valley

I grew up relatively sheltered and without much concern for the basic needs in life. Indeed like many in American society, I was pretty high on Maslow's hierarchy of needs. I remember being around 10 and having a big temper tantrum because my parents wouldn't get me the latest Power Ranger action figure, here kids don't even have time to have temper tantrums because they're too busy trying to survive.

In the past five days, I've been exposed to more poverty and hardships than I've probably been exposed to my whole life. "India is a land of happiness and sorrow." Ironically I wrote that as a little child came up while sweeping the floor of the train asking for food and money. It still hurts to say no and I don't know if I'll ever get used to it.

As an American, I am acutely aware of how wasteful our society is. When I think about how our money is being spent on wasteful wars like Iraq and financing political campaigns that promise changes that never happen -- money that could be used to help so many people if we tried -- well I'm just digusted with myself and the egocentric views of our society.

- Wyatte
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Goan' once...

Two corrections from my last post: I misspelled Colada, the correct spelling is Colaba. Also, apparently Bus and Wyatte have informed me that the girl who tried to throw the plastic bottle in the water at the Gateway of India was actually a boy. Oops!

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Goa is a stark contrast to Mumbai with its greenery, trees, the Indian ocean and just nature itself. The air is definitely a lot cleaner, even if trash is still a problem. Much to our disappointment, we came to find out that we really shouldn't swim in the water due to it being somewhat dangerous. All I know is that if I didn't see any of the Indians getting in the water despite being at the beach, I sure as heck was not going to get in the water myself!

We still had a lot of fun playing on the beach, walking along the shore, playing in the sand, and getting drenched by rogue waves; sneaker waves, I think they're called. Waves that are unexpectedly bigger than they seem and ones that drench you.

One of the reasons that Alim has female bloggers is to see their perspective in India, which is a patriarchial society as some of you may already know. I am aware of this, and it is difficult at times, due to being a strong person myself, not to get upset over things that happen. But it is inevitable and the four of us actually had a lengthy discussion about that last night.

First, let me back up and explain a bit: when we first arrived and secured a hostel at Anjuna Beach, we went for dinner at a local place near the beach. Once we walked in and sat down, a guy brought over our menus and passed them out to Bus, Tamer, and Wyatte. He started to walk away and I gestured that I didn't get one, the guy gave me a look that basically said, "...and your point is?". That really got to me and I lost what little appetite I had. I kept saying that I was fine and that I wasn't that hungry (which was true at that point). I kept telling myself to just relax, that it wasn't personal, that it's just their culture, and so on. After all, who am I to come to their country and their home and tell them how they should behave just because it is offensive to me? I am sure that some of my behaviors or the fact that I even eat beef might be offensive to some of them.

Not everyone is like that though and Goa does seem more progressive compared to Mumbai. We saw quite a few women driving motobikes rather than merely sitting on the back of them, which was a common sight in Mumbai. In some cases, the guys were sitting on the back of the motobikes behind the women!

When we rented motobikes, the original plan was to rent 4, but that didn't work out after the guy would only let us take 2 and dictated who could drive and who couldn't. I was surprised that he was ok with me driving one in the first place, and especially after taking the other two motobikes away from us. I shouldn't have to be surprised by that, but in this place, I am. That's due to the nature of things here. Really, it just depends on where you go and who you encounter.

During our discussion about this last night, it was interesting to see the different perspectives that we all had regarding this issue. One guy suggested that the inequality was merely perceived in that way due to expectations built up prior to commencing the trip. Basically, that it was simply psychological and that it really wasn't as bad as I thought, to which I retorted that it was easy for him to say due to his gender status, and not experiencing it firsthand.

This is not to say that it is horrible here and that I feel extremely disgraced as a woman, no. Actually, it is merely that, yes, I do acutely feel the inequality here as compared to America. At the same time, I am pleasantly surprised. I do have to wonder if it is different for me due to my race and nationality? I am curious to talk to Indian women about their perceptions and to see the perceptions of the other females of our group once they arrive.

Another guy suggested that I should be blunt and refuse to stand for that kind of treatment. That I should tell people who do that in no uncertain terms that it is simply unacceptable behavior. I responded that I was uncomfortable with doing that because again, who are we to come to their country and tell them how they should and shouldn't behave? Generally, I am just as assertive as I can possibly be and if I sense that I am treading on the boundary of acceptable vs. unacceptable behavior by their standards, then I back off and respect that and their culture. It is a huge learning experience for all of us and obviously there's no right or wrong answer/reaction for everything.

We leave tonight for another long train ride. Destination: Bangalore! We are excited for the rest of our group to join us, and Smitha is already there with her family, I believe.
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Mumbai and trains

First of all, my apologies for not identifying myself in my last entry. 'Tis I, KT.

Also, my apologies for the delay in between posts.

When I last left off, we were about to explore the city and explore the city we did! We decided to follow the Mumbai Moos' version of The Amazing Race in order see as much as we could in one day. I will spare you guys the descriptions of all the places that we saw since Avi and Aaron blogged about most of it already.

Suffice it to say that all in all, we saw the Dhobi Ghat even if we didn't realize it until later, the University of Mumbai (beautiful library!), the high courts, Colada, the slums, the Gateway to India, the Taj Mahal Palace hotel, and just Mumbai in general. We also planned to check out Chowpatty beach, but a sudden downpour ruined our plans.

Judging from the taxi ride to the Victoria Terminus (train station) alone, Alim was right: plan on plenty of extra time to get wherever you are going. The city is so polluted that its amazing, really. Just sitting in the taxi and driving with all the windows down due to not having AC left us all feeling not so hot from breathing in the air. Walking around the city alone coated us from head to toe in sweat, dirt, and grime. Let's not forget the trash, most of it ends up on the streets or in the water. Public trash receptacles are a commodity. At the Gateway to India, a little girl saw Wyatte's empty bottle and picked it up to toss it into the water and seemed quite puzzled when we clamored for her not to do that.

On the 12 hour train ride that we took to Goa the next day, trash went out right in between the welded bars on the open windows, effectively littering the beautiful Indian countryside. The toilets had no tanks to them: three guesses as to where all of that waste went and the first two don't count. On the ride, we could see people patiently sitting along the side of the tracks, buttocks exposed, just waiting for nature to do its work, never mind that it was in full view of hundreds of people on the passing trains. While waiting for our Goa train, a boy walked to the edge of the platform and urinated onto the rails in front of everyone, not even 20 feet away from where I was sitting, and nobody even batted an eye. It is simply condoned.

That was a bit shocking to all of us, I think. Another surprising thing: the crowds. When we first walked into the Victoria Terminus, the best way that I can describe the crowds is to compare it to an ant colony. It was just an extremely busy scene of literally hundreds of people in a small space going in about a hundred different directions. We didn't even know where to start, really.

The local train that we took for our failed trip to the beach gave a new meaning to the expression of being packed like sardines in a can. While waiting for the Magadon train to take us to Goa, we observed how quickly the platform could fill with people and how it could empty just as quick whenever a train arrived. Despite the general collectivist nature of Indian society, when a train arrived, mayhem ensued and it was truly every man/woman/child for themselves! People would push, pull, crowd, run, etc just to get on the train first and presumably find a good seat.

I like the trains so far, even if they are hot and not AC'd, for we have met some very nice people on the trains. On a local train from Victoria Terminus to Chowpatty, a businessman took interest in us and wrote back and forth with us for awhile, helping us to find our stop, and recommending good places to eat for dinner that night. In our original seats on the Goa train, what appeared to be a family of three Indian women and a little girl chatted with us and helped faciliate communication with the porters as well. We offered to pay for their meals to show our gratitude at their kindness, they seemed touched, but vehemently refused. I hope that we didn't insult them by offering. Then when the guy that was checking tickets made us move to our correct seats (oops!), we met two more Indians, one who sat with us, but only wrote Hindi, and another who went to university in Goa. We corresponded a bit with the Goan student and he said something that really articulated what we had seen over the past day or so: "India is a land of happiness and sorrows. In country like India where states like Bombay, Goa, Delhi, Bangalore are rich, there are also some poor backward people who are always striving hard to survive. India is a country where the only law fits good is (survival for the fittest)....."

When asked what his views on America were, he stated that he couldn't give any comments on America because the only thing that he could say was, "America is one of the strongest country <sic> in the world where there is no poverty and the standard of living is much <sic> high."

I do have to remark that despite all the poverty we see, people seem happy. Most are friendly, welcoming, and helpful.

There is more to be said on all of the above, but I don't know how to summarize so many experiences in a concise manner, and this entry is long enough as it is, so I will close for now.

I will update soon about our adventures in Goa! I am trying to attach a picture to this email of the four of us in Mumbai under the clock tower of the university, hope it works!

-KT
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