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Ganesha festival shopping plus more

Adam and I went to Bangalore to celebrate the Ganesha festival with my parents. We went shopping to an old market in Ulsoor.

Apart from the shopping, we have added photos of the festival itself. Check out the cool video of my mom making one of Ganesha's favorite sweets. -V

TSA in Hu-bba-alli?!

Check out the shirt my taxi driver was wearing yesterday! He loved the fact that I took his photo...I did enquire where he got it from..."market, madam!" -V

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Finally Getting Out to the Field

Last Friday I had the opportunity to join Dr. SR Hiremath (shown above), the director of Dharwad-based NGO Samaj Parivartana Samudaya (SPS), to check out an ongoing afforestation project on more than 350 acres of land in the southwest portion of the Haveri District (directly south of Hubli-Dharwad). SPS has linked local workers, local leaders, and the Karnataka State Forest Department together to develop this project. Currently there are more than 40 workers from nearby villages who re supervised by local leaders and paid using funds provided by the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA)*.

All of the species planted here are native to this region of Karnataka, and all of the seedlings were provided by the State Forest Department. SPS worked with the Forest Department to choose the species and verify that each sapling is at least one year old. Doing so ensures that the trees have a high probability of maturing and thriving in this environment. Dr. Hiremath explained that obtaining these native species from the local nursery was an accomplishment, as the Forest Department generally plants non-indigenous trees like Eucalyptus that is sold directly to the pulp and timber industry. Planting native species also provides more fodder for local livestock and biomass that can be used for firewood.

I found the visit to be very insightful, and was interested to learn how NREGA could be used not only to build local roads and schools, but also for ecological restoration. SPS is active in many of these initiatives, and regularly works with communities to connect their need to work with the organization’s goal of improving the environment. The key, Dr. Hiremath said, is that the locals understand that the citizens know that although NREGA gives them a right to work, it is also their responsibility to demand that the local leaders provide them with the proper work as well.

*NREGA guarantees 100 days of wage employment in a financial year to any rural household whose adult members are willing to participate in unskilled manual work. It has been heralded as important step towards realization of the right to work and arresting out-migration of rural households in search of employment while simultaneously enhancing people’s livelihood on a sustained basis, by developing the economic and social infrastructure in rural areas. Specifically, it aims to generate productive assets, protect the environment, empower rural women, and limit rural-urban migration by addressing chronic poverty, drought, deforestation, soil erosion and other forms of natural resource management.

Swine Flu Mania

Those of you who live in the U.S. probably recall the media frenzy with swine flu (H1N1). It seemed that every time we tuned into the news, there was some story or another about how the flu is spreading and how it could affect us. Eventually, things calmed down and luckily there were relatively few fatalities.

Well, guess what? That same hysteria has hit the mainstream here in India. Every news channel and newspaper is covering it to the max, giving hourly updates on where it has been confirmed and where we are in the national death count (about 30). Every other store has a sign in the window stating, "We Sell Swine Flu Masks," and there are actually people on the street wearing them (although not a majority...yet). Now, I am all about taking precaution and preventing the spread of a global pandemic, but I also think that this country has many more important things to worry about, including the spread of other infections and diseases (note: I made the same claims when I was witnessing this scare in the U.S.).

The swine flu scare has some positive aspects for me, primarily because it is believed to have been brought over from the West. Specifically, the number of beggers, hawkers, and generally curious people that approach me on the street have gone down dramatically. When I get on the bus, people are eager to get up and give me their seat as they move to the opposite side of the bus. Vidya and I even witnessed a woman shout "foreigner" as she pulled her friend to safety as we walked by.

Let us hope that the panic continues without their being anymore casualties, as I rather enjoy my freedom to roam the streets. - A

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Chili's restaurant in Bangalore! - A

The Auto God is reading our blog!

Ever since my rant on having to haggle with autodrivers...there has been a turn of events. We have a found a very nice autodriver (Mr. Sahadev) who likes our price and waits for us outside the gym pretty much every time we've been there. He also asks whenever we skip! (I don't think he's stalking us :)). Moreover, when we wanted to go to the shopping district after the gym he did not argue over the price and asked for what the locals would pay! We have started the process of becoming locals. Too much optimism too soon? I hope not. - V

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Impressions

Bathrooms in India are notorious for being unclean. Luckily for us the office has a whole bunch of stalls for men and women with Indian and Western toilet options (it's always nice to have choices :)). Furthermore, there is liquid soap and a hand dryer! Yesterday, after I used the loo, I noticed that the two women who typically clean the office were there as well. As they watched me wash my hands they started whispering. One of them walked up to the sink and started imitating me (while the other giggled)...however, then she went on to brushing her teeth with her fingers and washing her face...the whole time smiling at me! It was incredibly cute....it also made me wonder the kinds of impressions we leave on the people here! - V

I thought I loved skits....

until I am forced to play the same one everyday with the autodriver! The odds of them getting tired of it before me is highly unlikely....this is how it goes....
Me: Auto!!! Deshpandenagar?
Driver: Yes, please sit.
Me: (Before sitting) How much?
Driver: Rs. 80 ($1.60)
Me: Rs. 25 (50 cents)
Driver: no, no, no....ok...Rs. 50 ($1)?
Me: (looking mad/irritated...) I take this ride everyday, who are you trying to fool. Rs. 25 take it or leave it (and then I pretend to walk away like I have no cares in the world)
Autodriver comes to his senses, whistles, hoots, and hollers to get my attention that the price is right!

What's interesting is that I act out this skit EVERYTIME!!! Please autodriver when I quote a reasonable price, just say yes the first time through and get me where I want to go! - V

It's Pronounced Tal-vaalkers!

This weekend we joined a gym called Talwalkers. Yes, any regular American speaking person would pronounce it "Tall Walkers" but we learned during our fitness orientation that this is not the proper way to say it. Whatever you want to call it, it is amazing! The place is huge and has all the newest treadmills, ellipticals, and weights. When we signed up, they even gave us four free massages a piece. You cannot beat that!

We didn't find this place on our own though, and quite frankly, we didn't think that a place like this would exist in Hubli. The credit should go to Ajay Handa, who is the executive director of the Hans hotel, restaurant, and night club that is located right across the street from where the Deshpande Foundation is headquartered. For that tip alone, he will definitely be getting more of our business. Oh, and the food there is pretty good too! - A

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Where's the Target?

Vid's post about surviving Hubli is spot on. The city is relatively small from a geographical standpoint and conservative in nature (especially compared to western-like Bangalore). Getting around is easy once you get through the routine of haggling over the price of the auto rickshaw or finding the right bus route. But there's still one problem...I still don't know where to go to get anything! Locals tell us that the best (and only) place to go shopping is Koppikar Road, a street at least 5 blocks long with many different shapes and styles of stores. This problem is, there's no real order to the place, which makes it hard when all you want is to buy a couple of new pillows to enhance our capability to sleep in our super noisy guest house (post to come later with audio of the horns outside our window). Here's a quick synopsis of the sequence of events involved in purchasing a couple of $5 pillows...
1. Get on the bus near Deshpande Foundation - tell conductor that we want to go down to the 'old bus stand.' We pay our 4 rupees (~8 cents) each and hang on for the ride.
2. Bus stops short of the old bus stand stop. Because we cannot see the old bus stand, we just assume it is not our stop and stay on the bus.
3. 30 seconds later, bus goes by the old bus stand and we ask driver to stop the bus. He shakes his head and we continue on through the city for another 10 minutes until the bus finally stops again. We've since gone well past where we need to go, so hop off and decide to just walk back.
4. We finally get back to the head of Koppikar Road, around 730pm. As we turn to walk down the street...boom...the power on the entire street goes out!
5. We soon hear the sound of the diesel generators being cranked up and lights start to flicker on in the various storefronts. Scenes like this are quite typical in India, especially because the monsoon rains have been less than normal, thus limiting the amount of hydro power that can be produced this time of year.
6. We continue down the street, and suddenly, "Squish!" Uh-oh, I just stepped into something nice and fresh from some animal or another. Thankfully it will be tracked out before we get home.
7. A few blocks down, we find a home accessory store. It is relatively well lit and full of customers. It looks positive, and luckily for them, the place requires that we remove our footwear before stepping inside.
8. We go up to one of the counters and ask if they have any pillows. To our delight they have a half dozen varieties. We settle on one that is large and not too soft and pay for two of them.
9. Continuing with our luck for the evening, they only have one in the showroom and need to go into the back to get another one. Of course, because the lights are out, they are back there for what seems to be 30 minutes searching for one (I don't think it was really that long), randomly emerging with other-types of pillows that are not the same model (or price).
10. The store manager/owner finally realizes that we have been standing at the counter for what seems to be forever waiting for this pillow and grabs us a couple of chairs. "I rang up another store to get the pillow brought over here via cycle. It should only be another 5 minutes."
11. 15 minutes later, the clerk that sold us the rogue pillow is outside in the dark staring down the street trying to sight the deliveryman. Soon after, she comes back in with a smile, "It's here."
12. The clerk and store owner lead us aside with several apologies. "No problem," we say, "all is forgotten." In the end, we are happy to have what we sought out earlier that evening to find.
13. We leave the store, large pillows in hand, hail down a couple of auto drivers and finally settle on a reasonable price back home for what will no doubt be a great night's sleep. "Hey Vid, I am all about having an adventure," I say, "but tonight all I wanted was to hop in my car and go to Target!"

Never a dull time in Hubli!

Surviving Hubli

Each day I realize that I cannot take for granted however we lived in Bangalore to be how living in Hubli is or will be. There are no meter run autos, we haggle over the price of everything, and culture in general here is quite conservative....coming from Bangalore might just make it worse compared to just showing up from abroad....you come with higher expectations. Needless to say my adjustment here has been harder than Adams'. On the flip side I'm so happy to have Adam, he's been like the yogurt that you need after a spicy meal! ;) And the essence of India still runs thick...people are always willing to help, share, smile, and be curious....seeing kids running through the streets saying "hi...bye!" or the watchman who always smiles with a "Namaskara" is heart warming. - V