What I Love about India

What I Love about India

Everyone has a unique perspective and isn’t afraid to express it.

A person’s worth isn’t measured by the amount of STUFF he consumes.

Transcending the physical world is expected.

Every person I’ve met has tried to help me.

Nature and her creatures have intrinsic value.

Interesting spaces in ancient sites aren’t roped off.

The natural world glows in the morning and evening.

Poverty isn’t something to fear, but something to change.

Complexity of flavor and simplicity of ingredients are the norm.

Language matters less than meaning.

Color and pattern beautify experience.

Things take a long time and then happen suddenly.

Taj Mahal

   
   

 
      The tender grief that Shah Jahan felt after the death of his wife Mumtaz Mahal during the birth of their fourteenth child emanates from the Taj Mahal.  The faces of those visitors who emerge from the darkness of the main gate reflect the delicate beauty and peaceful longing of the Taj.

Mumtaz Mahal 1612-1631

Shah Jahan 1594-1666, 5th Mughal Emperor of India

   





















   
     The small rectangular stone that marks the remains of  Mumtaz Mahal is carefully guarded by a marble lattice work and lies under the center of the massive marble dome.

     The relationship in India with  Mughal rulers is complicated.  Over the centuries Muslims have ruled various parts of India.  Muslims migrated from Arabia to the southern coast as early as the 1100s and later Mughals came from Central Asia (Afghanistan and Persia) and conquered areas of India. These Sultanates, Nizams, Mughal kingdoms and princely states contributed to a certain merging of Hindu and Muslim elements especially in Indo-Islamic architecture.

     In the 1970s, due to economic conditions,  many Muslims left India to work in the Gulf Coast.  While that cross migration has abated somewhat with India's growing prosperity the influence of the Middle East can be felt in Hyderabad.
   
       While many Muslims in India today are converts from Hinduism, particularly from the lower castes, the history of invasion and rulership colors communal attitudes toward India's largest minority.

Poverty

Informal laborer.

Poverty

Poverty is a deceptively light powder 

That dusts skin and rims nostrils like burning trash

Drifts into cracks in knees and ankles

Coats unshod feet while it's
Shoveled into a plastic tub and 

Hoisted

Upon a twisted head rag above a slender neck where

Heavy and wide, it forces its weight into

Hollow eyes and hollow belly born by 

Movement

Of dusty unshod feet carrying 

Lightweight bone and flesh and skin and,
In a plastic tub on a slender neck,

Deceptively light powder that becomes a
Highway or a Corporate Office or a Place of Learning 

About poverty.

Informal construction laborers commonly carry cement on their heads in plastic tubs.  According to Dipanka Gupta, pre-eminent sociologist, in his lecture "The Hollowed Village and the Hopeful Slum" these informal workers have a 70% literacy rate and live in the hope of a better life having escaped rural impoverishment. 

See his lecture here:

Dipankar Gupta:  The Hollowed Village and the Hopeful Slum.

School of Excellence . . . India Style

     Upon visiting the private K-12 CHIREC school in Hyderabad, I was eerily reminding of my days at another school of excellence,  Cherry Creek High School in Colorado.  The same generous optimism, dedication, competition, and opportunity breezed across campus.

     While I was teaching at Cherry Creek, the expression 'Creek-style'  was thrown about by parents as well as administrators, and eventually I came to interpret it as "winning with grace."  Not that Creek displayed a hard-edged competitiveness, but I saw the style rather as a natural ease coming out on top in academics, sports, and the arts--with integrity and good sportsmanship.

     The same style was evident  at CHIREC in Archana Ajmera's tenth grade Cambridge math class.  Ms. Ajmera reviewed the formulas for coordinate geometry and within minutes every student was leaning forward, working problems, comparing graphs, listening for solutions while Ms. Ajmera projected hints through a projected computer screen.   The intensity was punctuated by jests, laughter, and "ah-ha" moments.

     The firm and friendly English teacher for the ninth-grade group in the Cambridge wing commanded the same attention.  With exams coming up, the summary review begin with a succinct list of summary skills, followed by group practice, sharing out, and then a quick evaluation of each group's writing.  Bright sun filled the air conditioned room.  All fifteen students were engaged.

 
      The same thorough teaching, self discipline, and respect for learning were on display in the CBSE (Government of India's secondary education system) in an eighth grade English class reviewing Frost's "The Road Less Travelled."
     Shooting hoops with students at lunch, visiting the crafts, music, and dance rooms where teachers and students were preparing for Parent Day, reminded me of Creek's commitment to educating the entire student, and many of these students had been in CHIREC since elementary days.  The school has become a community that leads other top schools and supports a school in need with student volunteers and resources.

     The school doesn't keep statistics on religious affiliation, but tries to create an inclusive international student body.

     The tuition?  Steep, but the school is ranked among the top twenty-five schools in India and includes students from around the world. When founder and director Mrs. Ratna Reddy opened the school twenty-five years ago, she set forth a vision that has given Hyderabad a unique foothold in developing twenty-first century learners in a setting of excellence.  In this inner-connected world, we can only imagine the synergy when Creek meets CHIREC to address the world's problems.

 

CHIREC Campus

Primary students practice for parent program.   

We Can't Laugh and We Can't Cry

     In spite of his precise English, personal integrity, and literary sensibilities,  Shuja is tasting despair.  With a graduate degree in English literature, he, like many highly educated youth in India, cannot find employment.  For him the 10% unemployment rate among college graduates is compounded by his religion

     Shuja never felt discrimination as a young Muslim student.  He attended school with a largely Hindu student population and performed routine rituals like everyone else.  However, out of 10,000 families in his village near Mumbai, he is one of the only ones who has attained a university education.  His people are largely informal laborers.

  This is not the source of bitterness though.  The taste comes from the fear that right-wing Hindu movement is targeting Muslims while ignoring social injustices and even atrocities committed against them. Killings and rapes impacting 2000 Muslims in Gujarat in 2002, initial false reports of Muslim perpetrators causing a deadly blast in Hyderabad, death by burning of an eleven-year-old Muslim boy in the army compound and subsequent suicide of an Army guard--these events combined with the lack of public awareness or outcry erode hope.

Reminder of atrocities committed against Muslim innocents

     The Prevention of Terrorism Act can be used to search and detain individuals seemingly for no other reason than that they are Muslim.  Even on campus, which seems to be a safe haven from "outside" forces, a place where freedom of thought and exploration of viewpoints is encouraged, members of the Ambedekhar Student Association (a social rights group) and others may come under surveillance by authorities searching for terrorist activity.  The forced detention of a friend (actually Hindu) by local police because he appeared to be Muslim brings this reality home.  When Shuja and his friends went to the authorities to ask why the friend had been detained, they received no satisfactory answer.  

Learn about Gujarat 2002.

    The discrimination weighs most heavily when Shuja considers the future.  A doctoral student with an emphasis on the Muslim diaspora, he wonders if his education will ever lead to employment, and if it doesn't, what value does it have?  When Shuja applied for a teaching position, he was asked if he had completed his studies in translated Urdu rather than in  English.  The assumption was that he must have received an inferior education and with his Muslim name, would have been educated only in Urdu.  Although Urdu is historically associated with Islam, the question is preposterous--what English major studies Shakespeare in another language?

     One question for Shuja and socially aware men like him, is how to evince change.  Extremist acts of violence  are unpalatable for followers of Islam, but the weight of discrimination, lack of opportunity, and acts of hate are nearly intolerable.  "We can't laugh and we can't cry.  We can only keep going."

Campus Grafitti

   

Young, Brilliant, and Muslim

     As soon as Raoff started talking, I knew I was in over my head--cultural references, media portrayals, history, philosophy. . .  I felt like a farmer in the presence of a scientific seed researcher.

     I'd scheduled an interview with three members of a student Muslim group to gain a perspective on the call for social justice under Indian law.  What I came away with was a respect for three men with varying personal views about their faith traversing a narrow path between righting social wrongs and being labeled extremist.

Learned men

          So what are these social wrongs?  The findings of the Sachar Report commissioned by the government of India in 2005 give some indication:

• Nearly 25% of Muslim children have never attended school
• Only 17 % of Muslim children of the age of 17 have completed tenth grade compared to national average of 26%
• Participation in higher education is 4%
• 31% of Muslims are below the poverty line.  They are the poorest group in nation outside Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes
• Overrepresentation in prison population.  In Maharashtra, Muslims represent 32% of jail inmates and only 10% of the population
• Inflated claims of Islamic terrorism, in which young Muslims are falsely accused and detained for violence resulting from other sources.

 Each deplores the irresponsible and inflammatory portrayal of Muslim people by the likes of Bill Maher in his interview with ben Affleck, Samuel Huntington's ill-substantiated and polarizing theory "Clash of Civilizations," and Richard Dawkins' much publicized anti Muslim statements.  The "axis of evil" statements and their collateral damage ignore the realities and demonize populations for political expediency. 

     The point is that politicians, talking heads, and uninformed citizens have placed civilization on a path that can only be reversed by true knowledge, fact-based understanding, and communication.  And in today's interconnected global world there is no excuse to allow those in power to do the thinking for the average man.

    The portrayal of Islam as a threat is compounded in Kashmir, a conflict-torn Indian state near Pakistan with a 74% Muslim population.   Control of the region continues to be disputed by Pakistan and India and the desire for self-rule.   These three friends were among the first generation to receive an education in the 1980s after years of struggle and subjugation.  Their school was founded by the resistance movement.  They received a secular and Islamic education and during secondary school, more focus on scientific education.  

     The actions of the Indian army in allegedly massacring 36 Sikhs to coincide with Bill Clinton's visit in 2000 and then blaming Pakistani Islamic groups  to build anti Islamic sentiment is the subject of a film, Adharm (Chittisinghpura Massacre).  The subsequent disappearance of Muslim men is echoed in Raoof's family history   This politicized religious history along with Indian military police acts of violence against Kashmiri women and young men to squelch protest forms the base of their collective personal history.  

     What solutions, then, are posed by these socially aware men who found their way from a simple education in Kashmir, with its history of subjugation, to post graduate work in one of the best central universities in India to the tensions I feel in Fort Morgan, Colorado?

     

     Bust Stereotypes:  Negotiate space to alleviate tensions caused by Islamic phobia.

     Invest legitimate Muslim religious institutions with political agency

     Re-socialize and restore normalcy:  Religion is only one aspect of an individual's identity. 

     

     At the end of the interview is the afternoon breeze, we found common ground.  Maybe a scientific seed researcher needs to ride a tractor and maybe the farmer can spend a little time in the lab.

     Talking and sharing personal histories allows for mutual understanding--for finding solutions.

Namaste

     The majority of the Indian  population are Hindu.  Before we get into a more scholarly discussion of the belief system, check out this webpage about henna, bindi, sun salutations, and toe rings.

20 Amazing Scientific Reasons behind Hindu Traditions

Let's Talk

The incredible diversity of India with 22 official languages, numerous religions, more than 4,000 castes works because of discourse.  People argue, share, disagree, socialize . . . much of the time.

According to German sociologist Georg Simmel, conflict contributes to order, stability, and equilibrium in a society.

So with that in mind, let me share two things I read today:

A poster about the Charlie Hebdo attack:

And an opinion piece in The Hindu (click it, it's a link):

The Invisible Face of Terror

Want to contribute to the conflict?  Hit "Comment" and hit it!

"I Have Ambitions" -- Hafsa

     After this twenty-first century student with cell-phone, earbuds, and a laptop helped me decipher a handwritten email address, I asked her if I could interview her about her educational experiences as a Muslim female.  "Of course," she laughed.

     Naturally, I had to get the hijab question out of the way.  She wore a colorful pink head scarf and was covered wrist to ankles with clothing one might see on any college campus in the US--a long top, leggings, and casual shoes.  Hafsa chose to start veiling about three years ago.

     Her reasoning?  When she's covered she's merely a person.  Her looks and physique aren't being "checked out" and so she can be known for her conversation, actions, and character.  She uncovers when with Mehram (family members or others that she could not marry), but generally Islam prohibits touching or gazing upon eligible men.  Hafsa says Islam also proscribes a dress code for men:  they are to be covered from the navel to the ankles.  These practices vary though based upon culture.

I didn't snap a pic of Hafsa, but this looks like her style.  

Mariam Sobh is the founder of Hijabtrendz, a fashion site for Muslim girls.

    

     Hafsa was educated in a Seventh Day Adventist school in this city through grade 10.  A Kashmiri transplant, her father, a banker, moved the family to Hyderabad when he was transferred.  At the Christian school, children of varying backgrounds were treated equally.  Only Government holidays, along with Christmas, were celebrated in school instead of Hindu or Muslim holidays.   After graduation Hafsa tested into an all-girl Intermediate College in biophysics for grades 11 and 12.  Students were grouped according to their marks and the best education was awarded the best students.

     Hafsa reports no major discrimination at the Intermediate College although India's affirmative action policy (known as Reservations) did not apply to Muslim students.  She notes that governmental practices on a larger scale may discriminate against Muslims in terms of limited funding for the maintenance of Muslim monuments, lack of enforcement for equal spending in Kashmir, a largely Muslim state.  She feels that socially Muslims are included in the life of the city.  

     Since her parents are fairly liberal, Hafsa never attended the Madrasa--an educational system that traditionally emphasized Muslin teachings.  The Madrasa, she says, is about the rules and restrictions of the religion rather than the beliefs.  

     Hafsa is studying psychology and has researched Martin Seligman's theories of happiness. She is currently investigating the neurological impact of diet.

Veiling: Nada's View

     Her name isn't really Nada, but since she's chosen to veil with the niqap (the face cloth that exposes only the eyes), I've offered to withhold her name from this post.

     When I first noticed women in Hyderabad in burqas, I was reminded of the nuns of my childhood.  We would drive to Sterling to attend mass at a time when there was both a convent and a K-12 Catholic school, and I remember my mother greeting the sisters in black habits and clunky black shoes.  Seeing the flowing burqas of these Muslim women takes me back to those days when Catholicism was something I could see, hear, smell, and taste with a sort of mysterious reverence.  Mass was said in Latin by a priest facing the altar and I carried a small leather-bound red missal to church.

      So when I saw Nada waiting for the campus bus and felt that same sort of spiritual calm radiating from her, I asked for an interview.  Her dorm room reminded me of a room in the convent in Sterling where I had been taken after becoming ill during a high school Catholic retreat.  I lay alone in a neat, unadorned room in the convent with a single bed and a desk and fell asleep in peace.  Nada's room had the same, simple silence.  

     As an international student from the Middle East, Nada chose Hyderabad, India for her post graduate studies for several reasons:  the proximity to her own region, the reputation for solid education, and the acceptance of veiling.  

     Nada wears the niqap because of the protection it affords:  both from the harassment and the interested glances of men.  She feels comfortable under the burqa because it is an expression of her devotion to God.  These concepts seem a bit foreign, but most of us don't travel in crowded public transport in a city packed with strangers, and while Christianity encourages modesty,  Catholic women haven't covered their heads in church since we used to pin the lace mantilla in our hair--or bobby pin a kleenex on if we forgot it. 

     So how is veiling an expression of devotion?   In about 600,  after the death of Mohammad's monogamous relationship of twenty-five years with his wife Khadija, he married nine different women.  These marriages were, according to Reza Aslan in his book No God but God, largely political alliances when polygamy was the norm.  Aslan states that because Mohammad's house in Messina was also the mosque and because delegations from other tribes would literally camp in the courtyard, he imposed hijab (veiling and seclusion) for the protection of his wives.  Over time and throughout different cultures this has been interpreted in a variety of ways, but some women now choose to practice hijab.

World Hijab Day - February 1

     Nada talked about the media portrayal of extremists who are not Muslim--only pretending to be for political gain.  This harms relationships and creates stereotypes.   The political unrest in her own country has resulted in many people, including her own mother, living now without car and electricity.  

     As the desperation of the situation took shape in my mind, Nada stated, "I am happy.  I am devoted to God."   

Save Us All--Tracy Chapman

Om Shanti

     Om Shanti.  This mantra may be a greeting or a farewell.  It means something like "I am a soul, an eternal being."

     A woman of the Brahma Kumari, a Hindu oriented religious movement in India, greeted the audience with these words before introducing guru Sister Shrivani at the Global Peace Auditorium in Gachibowli Sunday.

Global Peace Auditorium in Gachibowli

Interior lobby of the auditorium

     At breakfast Sunday morning a Parisian professor of physics asked if we'd like to accompany him to hear a well-known guru speak.  We were dressed in white--which proved fortuitous--so off we went in auto rickshaw to a pristine, white auditorium expecting nothing and everything.

      As foreigners, we were warmly welcomed by members of the Brahma Kumari as we approached.  The women were dressed in white saris, the men in white kurtas.  We were rushed through the immaculate white marble halls to the VIP entrance--I know not why--and ushered to fourth-row seats in the hushed state-of-the-art auditorium.  Contemplative music and nature slides set the mood for a white-robed Brahma Kumari who introduced the Chief Minister of the State of Andhra Pradesh and other officials accompanied by body guards and an armed soldier.

     After a ceremony of flower, shawl, and gift-giving,  the spiritual leader, a soft-spoken woman with the calm presence of a Hindu Mother Theresa, sat in a white chair and began to speak.  She reminded me of Celia Ruedas.   Her combined Hindu and English relayed the timeless message of peace, destiny, humility, happiness, acceptance, and renewed commitment.  The auditorium was silent except for the sound of her soothing words and, naturally, the musical notifications of cell phones.  The talk ended with an invitation to meditate at a temple on the grounds.  Nothing was for sale and no money was collected.

Sister Shrivani

     After we returned to campus, we asked several visiting professors what they thought of Sister Shrivani.  One initially used the word "cult" to talk about the Brahma Kumaris movement, but with the difficulties of communicating, I wasn't sure if the word had the same connotation it does in American English.  

     Ultimately these professors referred to it as a popular religious movement--particularly in suburban India--because of the emphasis on meditation and healthy living as ways to cope with the stress of contemporary life.  

      The following youtube link is of a talk largely in Hindu.  It begins with a meditation at about 6 minutes, but you can get the idea.  I'd love to know your impressions.      

Sister Shrivani --move to about 8 minutes.

The stage.  

     

     

Whole Lotta People

     When you come from a perspective of abundance, living in a developing nation can be bewildering at first. Developing nations are traditionally classified by Gross National Income per capta--when the average income is less than $1,026 US Dollars per year per person, a country is classified as developing, even when it is a powerful global player like China.  The definition also includes life expectancy, education, and a Human Rights Index.  This list is a bit dated.

     Eleven hundred dollars per year.  That's about $3 a day or $90 a month.  That doesn't mean that everyone in a developing country is impoverished.  Some people are living beyond the standards of the wealthiest Americans--just not a very large percentage.

     Not having "stuff" doesn't mean that people are lowlifes.  Living on little income doesn't mean people aren't artistic or talented or funny or happy.  In fact, in his lecture "The Hollowed Village and the Hopeful Slum" Dipankar Gupta states that the literacy rate in the slum is over 70%.  He characterizes the move from the small agricultural plots that can no longer support a farmer to the possibility of, at least, informal employment in the city is a migration of hope and upward mobility.

      The term "developing nation" does mean that many people are struggling to feed themselves and to survive everyday.  Certainly India's population of nearly 1.3 billion people compounds the challenges facing a developing nation. Systems are strained:  transportation (over 80 on a bus), internet (connectivity problems), power (periodic outages).

What's inspiring is the way people meet the challenges, typically with consideration for one another and perseverance.

   

India Eats

     How are you liking the food?

     I like most food; Indian food is no exception.   I've consumed almost no processed food,  no coffee, little meat since I've been here and I feel great.

     Some notable features of Southern Indian food:

• Dishes typically contain over five different spices or herbs--so a typical dish may taste spicy with hints of the Middle East along with a garlic onion base.
• Several small dishes are generally served with a carbohydrate (whether potato, wheat, rice, or lentil based) 
• The small dishes are mixed with the carb bit by bit and typically eaten with the right hand
• Meat is uncommon
• A wide variety of cooked vegetables (cauliflower, okra, tomatoes, eggplant, squash, potatoes, onions, green chiles) are prepared with a wide variety of spices 
• Dishes vary from region to region
• Sweets are generally tapioca or lemon bar in consistency
• Spices such as mustard seed, cumin, tumeric, chiles, peppercorns combined with herbs like mint, oregano, cilantro and the standard Asian garlic, onion, ginger combo
• Chai tea is smooth and coffee is served with sweetened milk

Breakfast today:  a savory pancake, Uttapbam with Sambar-
a spicy soup for dipping

Lunch:  Roti (tortilla-like) with creamy chutney,
gobi (cauliflower sauce),
a green vegetable I do not know, and yogurt called curd.

Biryani is Hyderabad specialty:  lemon rice on top,
served with chicken or lamb in a spicy sauce,
mixed together at the table in a metal dish

Dal is made from long cooked creamy lentils
with mustard seed, asfoetida, chili, cumin, and maybe tumeric.
India's comfort food. 

Dosa are crepes made with rice flour filled with potatoes or another savory veggie. 

Sambar is a uniquely spiced soup served for dipping or mixing with rice 

Sambal is an incredibly hot chili/lime condiment.  A dab'll do it.

Caste Matters I

     If I'd bothered to read my Lonely Planet a little more closely, or actually taken a class in Indian history, I might have known that the caste system is alive today.  But since I mistakenly thought caste had been outlawed and know just about nothing,  this is probably the first of many posts about the impact of the traditional caste system in India.
 
     Although my professor told me at our first meeting that I would need to take a class to understand the social makeup of Indian society to conduct the research for my project, the notion of caste as a defining factor in people's lives today didn't strike me--that is until a university student told me that when he and his girlfriend fell in love, they could not marry because she was a Brahmin and he was not.  It seems her father had listened to him politely and then said, "My daughter will never marry anyone who is not a Brahmin." That was the end of the relationship.

     So what is a Brahmin?

      In ancient times it is believed that Indian society was divided into four castes that sprang from the body of Brahma:  Brahmins from the head (priests, intellectuals), Kshatrias from the shoulders (soldiers, rulers), Vaishyas from the thighs (agricultural workers and merchants), and Shudras from the feet (servants for the other three classes).

      Excluded from the varna system altogether were Dalits (untouchables) who were not to be seen nor to see or hear any learning nor prayer because they would pollute it.

     It's easy to parallel this system with the feudal system of Medieval Europe.  In India, though, at some point, evidently, this system became a rigid hierarchical system used to govern.  Some say that the British used this during their colonization to divide the Indian people and rule them.
   
     Like many Americans I learned that discrimination against lower castes had been banned by the Indian constitution adopted in 1949.  I interpreted that to mean that the system itself had been abolished.  Not so.  In 2007 India's Supreme Court ruled that social organization based on caste is inherited and cannot be changed.  In my Social Stratification course, the professor stated that caste is a closed primordial identity.

     If I were to translate this to contemporary American society, I might say that it would mean, I am an ethnically Irish woman.  That is irrefutable;  it is part of my identity.  The Indian Constitutional Article 15 would simply state that I am not to be discriminated against because of this.  It does not say that I am not ethnically Irish and female.  The analogy, of course, is oversimplified because caste is also closely bound to occupation and social status whereas the historical restrictions of my status have not been a feature of bureaucratic government administration in the US.

     Of course, it is a topic of much discussion and social unrest.  Many Dalits have risen to positions of influence such as principal architect of the Indian Constitution B.R. Ambedkar and many others.

     Government regulations are in place in India to reserve positions in universities and civic careers for the Dalit caste.  These programs function somewhat like Affirmative Action in the US but are much more prescriptive.

     So in this little post, I have discussed only the Indian/Hindu system of caste, and have not begun to touch upon religion, be it Buddhist, Christian, Muslim, or Zoroastrianism or tribal people of the subcontinent.  

     I wonder if you think we have a sort of caste system in the US?  How fluid are our social classes?  What role has affirmative action played in equalizing opportunity for historically disadvantaged groups to gain equality.

     Feed me back:)

Mall Crawl

     Ahhhh, the familiarity, the sales, the global phenomenon--In Orbit Shopping Mall in Hyper City Hyderabad.

     It's all there: the upscale shops, the movie theater, the food court, the bargains.  Whether I'm in China, Japan, Brazil, or Denver, I can find a mall where girls giggle, couples stroll, and children beg--for toys.  India is no exception.

Oh yeah.  It's everywhere.

Food Court

     Ginea and I felt the familiar compulsion to flip through colors and styles, to compare prices, and to spend money at FabIndia, a sort of Banana Republic for contemporary men and women.

FabIndia

Online ad from FabIndia

   
     The crowd looked like a middle-class group of shoppers with kids in tow.  Just as in the US, I noticed a few serious shoppers with big bags, but many people looked like they were enjoying an afternoon of window shopping with a few purchases for the fun of it.  The middle class is a growing phenomenon in India.  Currently only about 5% of the country (50 million people) are considered middle class, but that percentage is expected to jump to 41% in ten years, according to the McKinsey Report.  The report also suggests that "spending on purchases that improve the economic prospects and quality of life--health, education, transport and communications will soar."

Shoppin' with the woman.

     The ethnicity of India is a topic of interest and academic debate, but the subcontinent may have originally been populated by a Dravidian civilization known as the Harappans who had their own language and were dark-skinned with black smooth or curling hair.  At some point the Aryans came from Persia--what is now Iran--and introduced Sanskrit.  Mongols from the far East also settled, as did Mughals (Persian Muslims).   Today India is home to many languages and people of various religions and ethnicities united in their plurality.

Panda Express like

          I grabbed a bite at a Panda Express-type place and ordered stir fry and a water bottle.  The stir-fry was spicy with chills and garlics but also contained a variety of spices which I have yet to identify that gave it an mid eastern flavor as well.  More on the food once I figure out the names of the dishes and their ingredients.

   

Safety First

     So do you feel safe?

     With the American news focus on the Charlie Hebdo attack in Paris and the subsequent raid in Belgium, people at home are asking the question.  So since India is a complicated country of pluralities, let me give a complicated answer.

     Hindu-Muslim violence is not unknown in Hyderabad.  I mentioned visiting the Mecca Mosque in the Old Town and explained that it is typical to see a Hindu shrine near a Muslim mosque.  One reason for that may be that each group is trying to "claim" the spot, particularly if it's considered holy or symbolic.  That propensity resulted in an attack on the Mecca Mosque in May 2007 causing the deaths of sixteen people.  Months later in August of the same year, two bombs went off simultaneously, one in an amusement park and the other near a popular restaurant resulting in the deaths of 42 people.  Then again in February 2013 double blasts went off in different parts of the city killing 17 people.  Extremist members from both national Hindu and radical international Muslim movements were suspected.  PhD student Siboy told us that although he feels safe when he visits Nepal, he doesn't always feel safe in his own country.
   

Metal detector and bag check at the nearby mall.

      However, life does go on, just as it does in the US after a school shooting or a theater shooting or a shooting in a workplace. Security measures are implemented, people take precautions.    The campus gates are guarded as is every classroom building and dorm (typical on many campuses throughout Asia),  business hotel entrances have a metal detector and guards,  bags are checked at supermarkets and stores (another cultural norm), and residence registration is required for all incoming foreigners.  Security is routine and people continue to drive madly, shop, and go about their business.

      Are the roads safe?

Sunday afternoon traffic in the Old City.

     It's exhilarating to ride in an auto rickshaw, even when it is inches from a moving bus in part because it doesn't move very fast--not over 40 mph.  Even Ginea, who is savvy and vigilant, said, "I feel safe in the auto."  Accidents are part of life, but not common.  Last week we saw a motorcyclist brake suddenly and topple.  Traffic slowed, pedestrians walked out to help him, and he continued on his way.
 
     The trains--are women safe?  Our facilitator Siboy helped us make our first train trip through Hyderabad and while we did see a man knock an old, seemingly drunk fellow to the floor of the train after he harassed him, no one seemed especially concerned.  The older guy got up and apologized;  the train proceeded to Lingumbali.  When we're on our own, Ginea and I will take precautions and ride the women-only cars, just as a proper Indian woman would do.

    So back to the question.  Do you feel safe?

     I suppose Bernard Maris felt safe when he went into the Charlie Hebdo office on January 7.  I suppose most of us feel safe when we go to work in the morning, expecting to return to home and family in the evening.

    The reality is that no one is always safe, but we go on living and loving and learning.