Day One ~ Delhi

We arrived to Delhi International Airport at about 3 am this morning, after another enjoyable flight on Etihad Airlines out of the UAE. Initially, we didn’t understand why all the hallways in the airport looked smoky, but soon we realized it was like that everywhere (indoors and outside) in Delhi that night, and it was just the smog. It was incredible how many people where out and how much general commotion there was at the airport at that time of night. Our group and another course section of students from Iowa, also on the India Winterim and our same flight, piled into a small 70’s vintage-looking bus and taken to the hotel. That other group of students had a 13 hour bus ride today to the location of their course, which made our group very thankful to arrive at the hotel where we knew we’d be staying for the next 4 nights.

Our group didn’t arrive at the hotel until about 6 am, and at that point both Meagan and I were wide-awake with the excitement of arriving. After spending most of the 6 am hour trying to (unsuccessfully) connect to the internet and then doing some unpacking, we walked down to breakfast through the rooftop patio that is right outside of our room.

While taking some pictures and admiring the lush vegetation, I asked Meagan when she thought we’d see our first monkey, and she shrieks and replies “LOOK! What is that?” Unfortunately (or fortunately?) it was not a monkey, but a herd of feral pigs—at least 20-30 adults (several of whom were mating every few seconds) and at least 25 tiny piglets, nursing on a couple of the mothers. For whatever reason, we took it as a good omen for our trip.

After breakfast we were finally exhausted and slept solidly the next 5 hours. Our group reconvened and ventured out of the hotel for an introduction by our host NGO, IRRAD, the Institute of Rural Research and Development. This was definitely a highlight of my day. We learned about the Mewat District of rural India, where we will be traveling to visit tomorrow, which is the problem area that our course is focused on helping. The history of the village people in this district is fascinating. They are a Muslim and Hindi meshed culture, who are described as being “stuck in the 18^th century” and “very backward” in many ways. There are several unique factors for this—in addition to the more obvious factors like extreme poverty, low literacy, and oppression of women—including historical religious oppression imposed upon the people (starting over 500 years ago), by “invaders” who forced the originally Hindu people to convert to Islam, or be killed; being totally left behind and not included in governmental policy in modern times, partially because they are a religious mix whom were never re-accepted by either religion, and partially because over the years of oppression and constant invasion these Mewat villagers became very rebellious and distrustful of all outsiders; and because water, perhaps the most valuable resource of all, is scarce and where present, is highly saline/unusable. This last factor is the main purpose of our course, and I will be able to write a lot more about this situation in the days to come after our site visits.

During the presentation made by our hosts at IRRAD, we were told that for our visit tomorrow we had to cover ourselves fully, and that the women in the group must where scarves to cover our heads! Immediately all the girls in our group (7 total), looked around at each other wide-eyed with astonishment, and concluded that we needed to go shopping that evening for scarves. This was our first big outing in Delhi and showed us two main things: how much attention our group will receive from everyone around us, just for being Caucasian and American, and second, how insane/dangerous the road traffic is. I have never been so scared of being hit by a vehicle as tonight when we were walking out of the “mall” area (where we luckily each found and bought a suitable scarf), even being lead by our IRRAD driver. Being in a vehicle is just as scary—since cars, bikes, people, rickshaws, mopeds, buses, trucks are all weaving in and out of traffic lanes, and only honking constantly to try and alert each other vehicle of their own location. It’s pure pandemonium to us.

Health wise, I’m feeling okay… I have been taking my malaria medication (and wearing my insect repelling wrist band) religiously as there have been mosquitoes around since our bus ride to the hotel earlier this morning (even one I can see walking along the wall in our hotel room right now). The food has been absolutely delicious so far, although my stomach has been feeling suspiciously unsettled ever since breakfast. Pepto-Bismol has been comforting for many of us today. The jet-lag is definitely present, as I watched several of my classmates begin nodding off in their chairs in IRRAD’s conference room earlier, despite the exciting issues everyone was genuinely enjoying learning about. On that note, I think it’s time to try and get some sleep before our Mewat site visit tomorrow which I am eagerly awaiting—if my head will be covered by a scarf!