This morning I woke up early (still jet lagged) and wandered out into the hall to look out the window at the residential area behind the hotel. It was fascinating and jarring. There’s so much going on, with so many impoverished people crammed into so little real estate. I saw a group of teenage boys sleeping on a sheet on the tile roof of their two-story apartment building. A couple of them woke up, urinated on the roof a little ways off from where they were sleeping, jumped from the top of one building to the adjoining one (at least a six-foot leap), and climbed down the open attic hatch into the building. Other boys from that group moved from the sun into the shade created by our hotel, spread their sheet back out, and laid on it as one fiddled around on his cell phone. Women pumped water from a communal pump. An old man washed and dressed himself. Motorcycles puttered from place to place, delivering jugs of water. A fetid canal runs through the area, filled with shallow, stagnant water and floating trash. Little boys defecated on newspaper sheets and threw them into the water. Women swept their porches with straw hand-brooms. Little girls in green school jumpers and white shirts and socks walked to school or boarded tuk-tuks (little three-wheeled taxis) to ride there. A teenager in an orange shirt and blue and white polka-dot shorts ate breakfast on a metal plate and then rinsed it using water he scooped out of a bucket by hand. Trash is everywhere. Every path is bordered by it; the canal is clogged with it; it fills the open area under trees and bushes. There’s a faded black-and-red flag on a pole at the end of the courtyard, and identical flags hanging from a string across a courtyard, showing the neighborhood’s allegiance to a particular Indian political party. It was the most fascinating people-watching I’ve ever done.
At 10 am we met our coordinator from Rising Star, along with some other members of the group who’d been staying in the hotel as well. We all got in the Rising Star van with our bags. As I spoke with them, I realized they’re an amazingly well-traveled group. There are a brother and sister whose parents are both doctors who’ve taken their kids on numerous international humanitarian adventures. There’s another sibling pair whose father is a counterterrorism officer in the New Delhi embassy. They’ve lived in London, China and a bunch of other places. Pretty interesting.
I saw some great street signs today as we were driving out to the village. The local traffic safety bureau has signs all over saying “Foot board travel is suicidal.” A foot board is a running board, I gather. Another traffic safety sign says “Love thy neighbor, but not while driving.” I’m not sure exactly what it’s referring to, but it sounds hilariously suggestive. Another sign said “Do not spoil this area by urinating here.” That’s a legitimate request, since I saw two guys peeing on the side of the road just during our trip out here today. And all kinds of vehicles have “sound horn” painted on the back. The drivers surrounding them are only too happy to oblige. Constantly. Sometimes there’s a reason for the honking, but sometimes not.
We stopped at a little grocery store to buy snacks. I wasn’t particularly starving so I wasn’t that interested, but I got a couple things, and Lily was somewhat more enthusiastic so she bought a bunch of stuff. I was shocked at how cheap everything was. We ended up with a shopping bag shoved full of stuff and it cost 269 rupees total—about four bucks.
As we moved into the rural areas we saw a lot of stereotypically Indian cow scenes—bony cows with with birds on their backs; bony cows eating garbage; bony cows lying on the sidewalk. At one point we passed through a toll booth. Vendors approached the slowing vehicles with all sorts of squalid wares: baggies of peanuts, sunscreens, cucumbers, sliced pineapple, and figs.
We got to the compound at about 2:00. It’s pretty nice. Very well-kept. There’s a school, dorms for the students who live here, a health clinic, the “Elephant House” where our quarters are, a separate compound for the staff who live here, and a bunch of other buildings. It’s a far bigger, more organized operation than the other humanitarian missions I’ve been on.
It’s still hot here. The paper this morning said that in the first week of July, they already had more days over 40 degrees (104 Fahrenheit) than any previous July. Yikes. And it’s supposed to stay this way until at least July 10. It’s supposed to be monsoon season, and honestly I think it would be cool to be in a big old huge monster monsoon.
Today was just an orientation day. They told us the rules—nothing that would surprise you—and we played a little bit with the school kids and ate dinner together. I played volleyball with the older boys at the school. They’re a lot older than they look. The 16-year olds looked 12 or 13, and the younger ones are proportionately the same.
It turns out this place is quite a bit less demanding than I’d expected. Tomorrow, for example, we’re on the construction detail and we’ll be moving bricks (cue the “I went to law school for this??”)—but we’re only doing it from 9-11 am. Then we’re done for the day until we spend time interacting with the kids at the school in late afternoon. I don’t mind that at all when it comes to me, but honestly I wish it were a little harder for Lily’s sake.
There’s a guy here who’s a professional dancer and teaches yoga every day. Guess I’ll check it out tomorrow morning. I’ll show him how good I am at savasana. Lily’s found a friend and they seem to get along really well. She’s about the same age, and they’re both in the “sub-group” Lily and I are in, so they’ll be together most of the time.
The view out our hotel hallway window.
We passed this LDS church on the way out of Chennai.
"Sound Horn," it says. Our driver obliged repeatedly.
Courtyard of the "Elephant House" where we're staying.
Kitchen of the Elephant House.
Entrance of the Elephant House.
