Happy Birthday Grandmom!

Considering I am 12 hours in the future and my sense of time is totally off, I wanted to send my love to my wonderful and sassy grandmother. So...

Happy Birthday Grandmom (alias Mum-z) !!

Thank you so much for always providing your hospitality and love whether I am in Upper Darby, Arizona, New York or even India!

Amristsar!

Amritsar! But a few words first...

Where has the time gone?! The past month and a half has gone by much faster than I expected. Now I only have one month left - what a weird thought. Three weeks of work - two more weekend trips, and if all goes as planned, I will go to Mumbai for a few days with Dennis and Allie for my final week.

And after one month and a half how do I feel... well, I no longer want to go home. Three weeks doesn't seem like enough time left here to do all of the things I still want to do. India is HUGE and you need 3 months alone of just traveling to even begin to see it all. I also feel very well-versed in Indian culture and current politics - even a bit of history. To be honest, I knew nothing about India before I came. I knew where it was on a map and that is about it. Now I know almost all of its geography - and if you name a city I can tell whether it is in the north or the south. And I feel so much more comfortable talking about Hinduism. I can identify about 6 gods (not much considering there are over 330,000,000) but before everything sounded foreign. I also know about the politics thanks to the book I bought before I came (In Spite of the Gods) which I recommend. I have also read White Tiger, The 3 Mistakes of My Life and Holy Cow!. All of which i strongly recommend to anyone who is interested in learning about India. Especially White Tiger. Definitely one of the top ten best books I have read in my life. Almost every intern has read it here and a ton of Indians im sure as well.

The second book I mentioned is an easy read, a fiction novel about three cricket-loving boys living in Gujarat (a state here). But it included political and religious elements as well that I was proud to understand thanks to reading In Spite of the Gods. Im so glad I enjoy the politics as well because my hope was to come to India as a jump-start for expanding my expertise from the Middle East to include Pakistan and India. A bit ambitious, but I like options. The last book, Holy Cow!, was written by a woman from Australia who travels through India when she is 21, hates it, then returns and has countless religioius experiences as she tries to find her spiritual self. Very good as well.
I realized just how much I have learned when Maria, Kylie and I were watching Slumdog Millionaire after we returned from Amritsar in the afternoon. I felt so cool knowing some of the Hindi! And for those of you who live and breathe that movie, remember back to the beginning when the two boys' mother dies due to a mob of people coming in and killing almost everyone. During this part the two boys see a young child painted blue in a sort-of dream like state, which the Millionaire host lets us know is Ram (a Hindu god), when he asks "What is Ram holding in his right hand?" Before I didn't even question why the boys saw a child version of Ram in the first place as they were running for their lives.

Now, correct me if I am wrong, but I believe I understand now. The angry mob was an agry mob of extremeist Hindu men who were incredibly mad due to there being a mosque on what they argue to be the birthplace of Ram. Now my details are a bit fuzzy on who started what, but essentially there was some act of violence done by Muslims against Hindu people, so the Hindu extremeists retaliated by bringing down the mosque in Ayodhya and subsequently killing mass amounts of Muslims, women and children included, in terrible terrible ways. This happened in 1992, but plans to burn down the mosque were probably in circulation since 1984. So it makes sense that the boys, who were Muslim along with their mother, would see Ram because it was this controversy that caused the killings in the first place. Phew.

Sadly, this entire controversy is still a very important political point and goal of the BJP (previous ruling political party in India), who still wishes to create a Ram temple on the mosque ruins. But the construction has yet to happen and remains incredibly controversal since the Congress party, a secular party, is currently in power (and for many other reasons of course). Sorry for the excess writing - but I really haven't blogged in a while so I have a lot to say! Now onto Amritsar...

Amritsar is known for primarily one thing: the Golden Temple. It is the mecca for the Sikh religion, and a significant number of Sikh people live in India. It is also the most visited sight in India for Indian tourists. So it is basically busy all day long, all year round.

So the North American four, Maria, Kylie, Allie and I, all boarded the train for our third trip as a group. After the sleeper train there, I somehow have the ability to sleep the entire time, something the rest of the girls are quite jealous of, we arrived in Amritsar. So we headed straight for the temple. And here it is in all its glory.

Beautiful, no? And it is entirely painted in gold! The temple sits at the center of a huge lake (man-made) and is surrounded by a rectangular marble pathway with guest rooms on the sides and an entire cafeteria. The best part is, you can sleep and eat for free! Since so many people travel here, it makes sense. But its not just the Golden Temple that is so hospitable, this is true for all Sikh temples. Although we didn't get a chance to, you can go to the cafeteria and get your basic chapatti and some sort of bean-ish food with it. As much as you want.

So we took a few pictures -

Just me!

Oh and I forgot to mention, you do have to cover your head - both guys and girls. In the lake surrounding the temple men can also bathe. So you will often see men undressing (they leave some sort of long underwear on) and bathing in the water. So the women have to bathe in a separate area - which seemed a bit small to me from the outside although we didn't go in... again, not sure why not haha. Here are the women:

So after walking around for a bit, barefoot of course, we waited for 45 minutes in the long line to enter the temple. We gave about 10 rupees donation each (you give as you can) and we received a banana leaf full of this brown stuff. Then once you make it to the front of the line and you can enter the temple, the men there take half of the brown food as an offering to God. Then you get to eat the rest! It was terribly greasy but so delicious and sweet. So we ate that and walked around the temple which had similar marble and stone designs as the Taj Mahal. Oh and the gold.

Outside the temple you could see all the carp in the water as well. They were the most beautful orange fish.

And on our way out to get our shoes, Allie and Maria were stopped by a family who wanted their picture with them. I wanted to show this because this happened about 234872047 times on this trip. It's quite funny actually when Kylie is in a bad mood because when men ask her for a picture they really wish they hadn't. But for the most part, we say yes to women and families, and absolutely no to any men. As for the families, we're not sure whether our faces will end up on the mantle in a frame or just in a family album. Mom with the Golden Temple, Mom with the white people, Mom with the kids... just normal.

So after that we went to the Jallianwala Bagh memorial. Basically when India was fighting for independence, the British were often unruly with their response. So a group of Indians in Amritsar were holding a peaceful protest, and the British general ordered in troops to stop them, and the troops just fired at the people who had no way to defend themselves. So many died on the spot and many died trying to save themselves by jumping into a huge well (all of these people died as well). So they made the area a beautiful park and you can see the well which is still there. So we spent some time in the park and layed in the grass and read a bit.

Then at about 4PM we got a rickshaw driver to take us to the border closing ceremony. This is a huge ceremony that happens every night at around 5:30 or 6, where the border closes between India and Pakistan. That's right, I was about 100 meters away from Pakistan!

So the entire place is packed and filled with screaming Indians who are brimming with nationalism. Then there are also men or should i say guards, who a dressed in a bizarre and hilarious costume.

So the ceremony begins with a man screaming into a microphone "HINDUSTAN!" (ie, India) and then the crowd responds with something in Hindu. I was cheering it with them, but Im still not sure what I was saying - oh well. And from where we were sitting you could see a huge crowd on the Pakistan side as well doing the same thing. Although Im pretty sure India had more people and was much louder.

Then they have countless numbers of people alternate running to the gate at the border and back with two Indian flags. After that, they played about 8 upbeat songs (which im sure were patriotic) and there was a huge dance party on the street with about 50-100 people. Man those Indians can dance - and they are good!!

Then the actual ceremony began. A picture would not do it justice. First, one of the men in "uniform" screams into a microphone for what seems like an entire minute without taking a breath. Amazing. This happens a few times. Then simultaneously, different Indian men stamp up to the gate while Pakistan's men do the same (similarly dressed in an absurd costume). This stamping march includes high kicks and screaming. Then they thrust the gates open, stamp some more, shake hands, and throw the gates closed. This happens a few times. Each side stamps louder and with more energy each time to show how strong they are. So bizarre but incredibly entertaining.

It is at this point that I love India the most. They are so patriotic and such good dancers!! After this we head back on the one hour drive to the golden temple. At dinner, we have two types of Paneer, Malia Kofta (my favorite!) and Aloo Govi (my other favorite). We all share and dig in with our chapattis. Best Indian food I think I've eaten all summer. And the lassi in Punjab are twice their normal size - delicious!!

Then when we get back to the Golden Temple around 11PM, we set up our spot on the marble floor where we will be sleeping. The temple was so beautiful at night. We also captured some men holding hands (very Indian) so I thought I would share.

Its a little difficult to see, but you get the picture. The night was a little annoying because we had a stalker who wouldnt leave us alone, and about a crowd of 20 guys staring at us. Thankfully, one of the Sikh guards working there yelled at them to get away from us at one point, although new ones came back.

After about 3 hours of sleep, we were kicked and woken up with water splashed on us. They needed to clean the floors. We could have found a new place and slept some more, but we decided just to head for the train station to wait a bit before our 5:30AM train. Overall, I would say the trip was a success.

Its funny how some times I love India so much and at other times I hate it. It is a constant feeling of ambivalence. I loved India so much at the border closing ceremony when you see how wonderfly patriotic the country is. But then, when we are followed and watched by creepy men, even in the most sacred of Sikh temples, India can be very annoying. I guess that's the price you have to pay though. I'll reevaluate in 3 weeks.

I went to Nepal and somehow I lived...

So last minute .. that is, 5 days prior, I decided that I would go to Nepal. I mean, why not? It's located in the north above India to the east and its been proven that saying you went to two asian countries over the summer is cooler than just one. So i booked the train ticket there with Alvin (New Zealand) and Kylie (my Canadian travel buddy) and a plane flight back. So we left Friday night for what we thought was going to be 24 hours of train and bus traveling. Ohhh were we in for a surprise.

So we show up at the train station for our 5PM departure time and our hour later, without any announcement that says our train is delayed, the train has still not shown up. So we continue to wait. 2 cups of chai and 2 cups of fake coffee later, still no train. So Kylie and I go off to the "Enquiry" stations to find out what is happening. Turns out all of the Enquiry stations are closed for the day... typical. So we somehow break into the place where the train workers are working - props to Kylie - so we can get some questions answered. Still no one knows. How is this possible you ask? The answer... its India. So we head back to meet Alvin who lets us know that in the 20 minutes we were gone, the train both came and left. Fantastic. But lucky for us, its returning in 20 minutes. It was at this point that I think we created the "surprise scale" that we would soon use for the rest of the trip. Essentially, we assess at one level, from 1-10, we are surprised that something has happened. So about 40 minutes later, at around 8PM now, the train finally comes and we arrive in Sonali (on the border of India with Nepal) 14 hours later.

So then we get a taxi to the border and go to the Indian immigration office:

Yep, that's it. Surprise scale? Zero. So then we head through the Nepal border (very exciting!!).

Horray! Then we head to the Nepal immigration office with some new friends we made in the taxi ride - a guy from England who comes to Nepal every year in the summer to work with the same village, and a guy from Sweden who is traveling all over Asia. We were going to wait for the guy from Sweden because we were all going to Pokhara (another bus ride away) but we thought we wouldnt be able to because it took us 4 hours to get our visa from the Nepal embassy and he was buying his at the border. It took 5 minutes. Suprise scale? 6 - I was actually quite impressed. So then we head off to find the next bus leaving.

After we buy our bus tickets we wait around 1 hour for the bus to come even though it was scheduled to leave in 15 minutes. In India (and I guess Nepal as well) you must learn the art of patience. I've been getting better. So then we board this:

The tin can of doom. Let me first inform you of what the Lonely Planet book on Nepal says about the buses: "Bus travel in Nepal poses a significant risk of accident. It's uncommon to drive for more than an hour on any stretch of road without passing the burnt-out shell of a public bus crushed like tin foil into the canyon below. Travelling on an overnight bus is probably the most dangerous thing you can do in Nepal, and is certainly a bigger risk than that currently is posed by the Maoists and even more dangerous than the bungee jump (only kidding on that one). You are 30 times more likely to die in a road accident in Nepal than in most developed countries."

Needless to say, after I read this in India I refused to take a bus. But somehow... we ended up taking a bus. We talked to the experienced English guy who came to Nepal a lot and he said its only bad if you take it at night. So we said, sure not problem our bus leaves at 4! Problem. Not only did our bus not leave at 4, (somewhere around 5:30 to be exact) but the driver made three 20 minute stops within the first hour of movement. Our surprise scales we adjusting with every stop.

So by the time we were finally on the road, it was pitch black out. Then we began on the road that would last for the rest of the trip to Pokhara - a small barely-paved road on the side of gigantic mountains. To our left, there was the mountain. To our ride, I saw the largest drop (imagine looking down into the Grand Canyon) I think I have ever seen in my life. At least there was a river with rapids at the very bottom right? That is, if we would survive the 2 mile fall. Oh and there weren't any of those cushy barriers that exist in the US - oh no. It was just the end of the road and then plop! ..there goes my life!

The next 12 hours were the most horrifying 12 hours of my life. I first hyperventilated for about 2 hours with a death grip on one of the bus seat ...like that would save me. Then as Alvin and Kylie tried to calm me down (somehow they were able to sleep even though they knew we also had about a 50% chance of dying) and I listened too happy music on my Ipod. Thank you, Hairspray. And of course, to top off the horrifying turns on a bus moving much to quickly for that altitude, there were other cars on the road. Oh and not just cars - trucks. So there would be a bus (usually us on the outside closest to our pending doom) and a truck on the inside. Wonderful. Then the driver also stopped another 4 or 5 times. One stop at about 3 AM lasted over an hour. Considering I didn't sleep at all because I wanted to be conscious when I was dying, these stops for who knows what became increasingly annoying. I just was praying he wasn't drinking... although that would have been about a 4 on the surprise scale.

Somehow... we lived. I literally kissed the ground when i stepped off the bus. Somehow we found a guest house to stay at when we arrived at 5 AM and we stept til 12. When we woke up - we noticed... Pokhara is BEAUTIFUL. Just wonderful. So after some delicious breakfast we headed out for a boat ride on the lake.

This was just the relaxation we needed!

After paddling for a bit we stopped at a small idland in the center with a temple on it. And here we took another picture...

Only odd part about the Temple Island was that there were a large number of decapitated pigeons. We asked our boat driver and he clarified our suspicions - they were definitley decapitated by humans.

After that we decided we would walk around and see the shops, town and get some lunch. The signs were pretty hilarious at some of the stores.

After lunch we did a few touristy things like see Devi's waterfall. Apparently a European woman, Devi, was bathing in the waterfall with her husband when she fell down it and died. It's now named after her. It was pretty.. but it makes me wonder who would bathe in it since its pretty obviously deadly. Then again, I did willingly take that bus ride the night before.

Then we went to a temple cave (we weren't allowed to take pictures of the temple though. Then cave was located right under Devi's Fall so it was dripping water down there.

Then we had some dinner (looking back we mostly ate there). And I got some authentic Nepali food! Basically like Indian, but with rice instead of chapatti. And they eat it all with their hands too! This was our view from the restaurant where we ate outside:

The next day we woke up at 5 am to go to the top of some mountain to get a view of part of the Himalayan range during sunrise. It was pouring but we had to pay our driver anyway (500 Nepali rupees each!!) It was incredibly foggy so we saw nothing. But then we went back at around 4 for only 300 rupees for all three of us (much better) an we saw it!They were SO TALL. It is difficult to describe. I know we have huge mountains surrounding us in Arizona but Dad, you would have died. It was amazing. This one's name is Annapurna and its is the 10th tallest in the world. Actually 8 of the top 10 are in Nepal - the other two are in Pakistan (K2 and another one).

This is us in our Indian squatting pose!

Alvin always looked off into the distance in every picture...

So then the next morning we went to our FLIGHT to Kathmandu. We were previously going to bus it there as well but I would rather cut off my toe than do that again. They could have charged me $300 and I would have agreed. Good thing they didn't..

This is our plane! We actually got to step only the runway and get on it (AKA one of my life goals). Check!! The plane ride took a total of 20 minutes and it was remarkably smooth - suprise scale? 11!!!

For the afternoon and the next morning we explored Kathmandu. It is like a typical Indian town but MUCH cleaner. We only saw one person on the street!n To kill time we also went to see Transformers 2 in theatres (it was awesome) and I started getting excited about next year because half the movie was set in Jordan (woo!). Overall, Nepal was great. The weather was amazing (I actually didn't sweat!) and the mountains were gorgeous. Kylie and Alvin even took the plane ride to Mount Everest in the morning on Wednesday - i didn't see it as worth it unless I planned to trek to see the mountain so I slept in :) But we were also happy to get back to Delhi where the prices are not so ridiculous (for some reason everything was so expensive there in comparison). And Delhi was happy to see us too - welcoming us with a big whiff of shit. Ahhh.. home sweet home.

It is so hot here! I am sweating all of the time. And yes, that is as disgusting as it sounds. It's a bit frustrating to never look my best either - I want to tell people, "I promise! I look good when there is AC! I can even wear my hair down!" There i basically no point in trying to look nice here though - at least not for me! I just wear whatever is most practical and even those clothes don't last long!

Well enough complaining. I got a request for a few pictures of people and the place where I am living - so here it is!
This is our living room in Vinoba Puri 1. As you can see, the living arrangement is fabulous! Haha but really, we have one of the nicest apartments. It's not perfect, but its fairly roomy and I like it.

This is our kitchen. We have a gas stove, a hot water boiler and a crappy toaster. All the necessary tools to make a low-budget breakfast and dinner. I usually make oatmeal with honey or eggs at least once a day - may sound plain but those are my favorite foods! Then Kylie Maria and I will cook vegetables and some form of carbohydrates almost every night - usually just pasta or rice. Our primary "favoring" that we add is salt since the Indian spices are MUCH different than what we are used to. So pretty much everything is incredibly salty. MMmmm

Now it is time to meet some of the people I have been talking about! The two above are two of my closer friends here: Josephina (left) and Kylie (right). Josephina is from Samoa (an Island in Oceania near Australia). She is pretty much hilarious. So unfortunate that she is leaving in one week!! She was here for about 3 months, just like me, and on Friday she is off to London so see her sister and will continue to travel for about 3 months or so (so lucky!). Early this month I got to meet her sister too when she came to visit and we all went out to eat. Right now she is in Rajasthan on a camel safari with Dennis (Hong Kong) and Karl (France)--if I think I am hot then I can't even imagine how much pain they are in right now!

Kylie, Kylie...where do I begin. Well, she is from Canada! She came here around the same time I did and so we have been doing all of our trips together. We pretty much got along immediately - she reminds me a lot of my friends who arent afraid to say exactly what they are thinking at the time. Its pretty hilarious as well since she is basically gawked at no matter where we go as she is about 6 feet tall. She rows for her university in Canada and plays American football there as well - defense. Theres a small clue into her personality! Here she is teaching English and French (of which she is fluent in as well) at a hole-in-the-wall language place in Delhi. Oh and the Indian men just love her - I have maybe been asked if I am married once or twice - but she is probably asked daily. Since she lives right across the hall I would say I spend most of my time here with her. She is was without a doubt the person that made me start liking India in the beginning. It was difficult to connect with any of the other international interns at first with so many differences and my being shy of course - and then Kylie came along. I was like, FINALLY someone I can talk to.

This is (from the left) Maria (USA), Allie (USA) and Thyjs (Holland). These are the other three people I spend most of my time with. Ill begin with Maria. So she moved into the flat across the hall from mine about 5 days after I did. I was excited to have another girl from the US moving in so close. At first I thought we really wouldn't be close at all. She just seemed so different from the people I usually hang out with. Boy was I wrong. After our trip to Agra (with Kylie and Allie) I realized she was one of the coolest people I have ever met - just took a little to get to know her! She goes to Boulder and will be a senior next year. We have a lot in common with our life plans - she wants to study international law (like me!) and specialize in child rights. She works for a related NGO here and has already been placed on the Board of Directors - maybe its India, but she really has an addicting personality. Her laugh is also hilarious - very hearty. We like to kill time at night and get out of the unbearable heat by going to Cafe Coffee Day (the closest thing to a Starbucks in India) and just sit in the AC for an hour and eat ice cream. Im already thinking up ideas in my head of how i can visit her in Colorado this coming year haha.

Then in the middle is Allie Joe from Minnesota. Yep she has the accent and all! When I found out that there was an American girl who moved into one of the other flats (about 3 days in when I was feeling incredibly homesick) I basically made Alvin (New Zealand) take me to see her haha. Ever since then I see her fairly often (not always since she lives in the flat the farthest away in Delhi) and of course she is our 4th member of the group people refer to as the "North American girls" since we always travel together. She is adorable, so fun to be around, and somehow her hair always looks amazing (still not sure how she does that in the heat but I plan to find out). She works with hurt animals in a shelter/vet in India. She describes her job as playing with a hurt baby monkey all day. SO JEALOUS! Her greatest quality is that she loves everyone ... although her tendency to smile and be friends with everyone comes back to bite her in India since the men take it as she wants to be their bride. eek.

I know she has some problems at work because she is friends with the guys who work there who are apparently of a "lower class." The other girls that volunteer with her there are more wealthy and seem to think they are "higher class" so they tell her not to talk to the guys there at all. This really upsets her. Im glad I dont have to deal with that at my work because I would be incredibly mad if anyone told me not to talk to someone because of their darker skin color or lower caste. Thats bullshit. So she ignores them as far as I know and just continues to be friends with anyone she wants to be. So good for her.

The last guy on the right is Thyjs. Pronounced "ty-s" with an emphasis on the "s." Allie just calls him Taj though and I think I alternate between the two names. He doesn't care. He lives with Allie at the other flat so they are basically attached at the hip. He has already been here for quite some time - maybe 6 months or longer. So he's an expert on everything I am a novice at. He is always incredibly happy and easy to get along with (maybe thats why Allie and him get along so well). Unfortunately he leaves around July 17th - but he has been here for half a year!

Considering I am terrible at taking pictures, I really dont have many of anyone else - whoops! But these are the people I spend most of my time with so this will have to do for now! I am going to work on taking pictures of the office and the people I work with there as well.

Zill out.

The Job.

Right now at work, it is noisy, windy and hot. Without AC, we have three fans going and two air coolers, that is, when the electricity is not out which happens for at least 2 hours a day. Ram (one of the Indian guys who work here) is currently wearing my green Old Navy flip flops around the office. I am sitting on the floor with my shoes off on a rug/mat with a “sitting desk.” (All of the desks were occupied today so I don’t get a chair.) It really doesn’t bother me except my feet fall asleep every 30 minutes. The sound in the air? Hindi, with a hint of English here and there. Now they are bringing around sweets (so sugary it gives you a headache) for one of the guys who is celebrating his 5th wedding anniversary. I lied, its cake. I am now holding it in one hand while typing. Plates and forks? Absolutely not. Still wearing my flip flops.

Working here has opened my eyes to the world of Indians. To start, we (when I say we I am referring to the 3 other international interns I work with) have about a 1 hour commute to work every day. One hour there, one hour back. I thought this was bad, riding a bus for 45 minutes, but two of the girls who work here ride a bus for 2 hours to get here. Seema leaves at 7 AM, after teaching a class at her home from 6-7, for a three hour bus ride here from her village. Talk about a commute!

The funny thing is that I don’t even work in Delhi either – and Delhi is a state here! I work in UP, aka Uttar Pradesh, which is the next state over. Outside of my office you can see the construction of a huge mall (named Angel Mega Mall of all horrific names). Then when you look straight ahead you usually see anywhere around 6 to 15 cows just hanging out in the heat. Then to the right there is a slum. Not a huge slum, but a slum none the less. I still wonder if the people will be kicked out of their homes once the mall opens… or maybe just told to relocate.

Now I should probably explain the foundation. Its official name is the Public Cause Research Foundation (PCRF). It is a recently opened branch of Parivartan, which is a larger NGO that works on spreading information about RTI. RTI stands for Right to Information, which was a national act passed in India in 2005. This act is actually quite impressive. As a measure that was intelligently designed by a group of bright lawyers, the act allows any Indian citizen to obtain information about well, anything. Say for instance the government is paving a road by your house. You can fill out the application and ask questions like, “How thick is the road supposed to be? Can I have a sample of the road material? Who is responsible for the road construction?” Then, the Public Information Commissioners (PIOs) are required to provide that citizen the information within a maximum of 30 days or they will personally be fined and part of their paycheck will go to the information-less citizen. Needless to say, the threat has been working.

India is full of corruption. I knew this coming here but I really had no idea how FULL OF CORRUPTION this country is. If you want your passport, you have to pay a bribe or you will never get it. Simple as that. So many government employees use their power to get more and more money. Back to the road example, a citizen may request this info because a road plan will say the road needs to be 6 cm thick, for example. Then, the builders or govt employee will negotiate to have the road be only 3 cm thick, and the government employee or officer will walk away with the unused money. Simple as that. Luckily, with RTI, citizens have been scaring these government officers into actually being accountable. Imagine that.

So PCRF, my branch of the NGO, is to plan the RTI Awards ceremony. This was the idea of one of the most famous RTI activists in India, Arvind, who is currently working in the other room. It is a foundation because he is funding the entire awards project from the money he won from an award. I also think a Bollywood star is contributing some as well. So we are going through every commissioner and appeal report that is related to RTI. Every one. I believe I heard the number 45,000 last week. It is insane. So we are evaluating every PIO to see in how many cases they supply information and in how many they deny information to the citizens. Then they will all be evaluated and winners will be chosen. There are awards for the two best Commissioners, two best PIO’s and one for the Best Citizen. This is where I come in.

After first sifting through the PIO reports for around the first 2 weeks, I now am being harnessed for my superior English skills – horray! So I am taking nominations sent in by citizens, either nominating themselves or another citizen, and I am writing their stories related to RTI. Then these stories are published in newspapers all around the country, translated into any of the 27 languages spoken here. I was shown one of my stories in a Hindi paper just yesterday (although there is no way for me to know it is mine because I cannot read Hindi). But Ill believe them for now.

As for the people and dynamic of the foundation, a lot of it has been very eye-opening. Ill begin with lunch, probably the most interesting piece to share. When we eat lunch (somewhere around 2 PM everyday) we eat all together. There are no cubicles to eat in and certainly no cafeteria. People do not pair off into their friend groups. It’s a big lunch fest together. The best part is, everyone eats off of everyone else’s plate. Now if anyone knows me, they know that I love to eat other people’s food. Indians take it to a whole new level. There is no “hey, can I try a bite?” you just eat it off their plate. Sometimes I think some people don’t bring or buy a lunch at all and just other people’s food. Once, Hannah (the girl from Poland I work with) bought two Samozas in the morning to eat for lunch (they are like a bigger friend potato dumpling). Bad description I know but you can all google it. So she brought two and we were sitting down to eat. She was eating one, and I had a bite or two of her second one, just small bites though. Then one of the guys who works here who was sitting to the left of me (Hannah was to my right) picked up the Samoza and took a bite. This was normal that he was eating her food without asking of course. But then he kept eating it and then finished the entire thing. I just stared at him shocked in my head. He ate half her lunch in 4 bites! So for those of you who would have punched him then and there, I think you can understand how eating here is VERY different.

As for the rest of the people, everyone is very nice. Everyone jokes about how Amit (one Indian guy) loves Dennis (the intern from Hong Kong). They LOVE gay jokes here. Appropriate ones of course.

Then we also have a guy, Mehtab, whose entire job is to make tea. He gets lunch as well, but mostly just tea. So he makes everyone a baby cup of chai in the morning and in the afternoon. Chai here is Indian tea with lots of milk and LOTS of sugar. That’s why I think we only drink a small tea-cup’s worth at a time. In general, labor is just so cheap here though that having a cook and people cleaning your home or even a driver is normal. One more thing about working too is that although us interns do not need to work Saturdays, everyone else works Saturdays here. The entire office. And that doesn’t mean you get overtime. Sometimes they do Sundays as well if the boss thinks we need to get more done. Indians are hard workers, that is for sure.

That pretty much sums up work. Speaking of work, I should get back to work. Update coming soon on my most recent trip to Ajmar and Pushkar, though!