First Impressions

So much has happened in the last few days! A very long post…

For the first few days we were together, all the international students (mostly Americans) sat around in the common area getting to know one another. We didn’t have orientation yet, or bikes, so we couldn’t wander around campus—it’s far, far too big. We complained that the bandh was keeping us indoors, as the campus had shut down with the rest of the city. A bandh is a one-day strike organized by the ruling political party that shuts down the entire city; no one works, everyone stays at home. This one was instituted because of the Telangana protests.

Andhra Pradesh is split into two parts: Andhra and Telangana. Telangana is one of the lesser developed parts of India, and some of its people want to split from the Andhra Pradesh government and start their own. Why is this important for Hyderabad? Because Hyderabad is the capital of Andhra Pradesh, and is located in the Telangana region; if Telangana becomes a new state, Andhra will lose its IT industry. Most of the protests have been at Osmania University on the opposite side of Hyderabad, so UoH has been pretty quiet except for a few small marches of no more than 20 people. A few of us were in one of the outdoor student centers while they were setting up for a rally. There was chanting, a drum, a bonfire, and someone carrying a huge Ravana puppet (Ravana is the ten-headed Hindu god/demon with the knowledge of ten scholars that, although he is often considered an antagonist, is also capable of being an excellent ruler.) Perhaps the ten heads also were symbolic of Telangana’s ten regions? To calm nerves, no, I have no intention of participating in any of these, as I don’t really know what’s going on, and even if I did, protesting as a white American girl would be a terrible idea. However, in the next few months, everything will either go back to normal, or I will be in Hyderabad as history is made.

(Photo: piled in the back of an auto-rickshaw after shopping for New Year's punjabis. L-R: Allison, Rosemary, Melody, Caroline, Laura, me)

On New Year’s Eve, I’d befriended some lovely girls. I’m rooming with Rosemary. Since there’s another Kelsey around, they call me Kelsey LeAnn. Rosemary and I were at the SIP office when our shuttle unfortunately left us. We were outside, trying to figure out our way back to the student center when we met a fellow Tagore Int’l House resident Ali…who had a motorcycle. He gave us a ride back to Tagore and introduced us to his friends Amir, Alaa, and Achmed. The bandh was over, but there was a lot of hesitation to go out for New Year’s because of the unrest. Because of a pretty wild Halloween party this fall, Tagore is now a dry house (we don’t know yet how strictly this is enforced, but we didn’t want to test it too early). So we grabbed Caroline and Melody, and the four gentlemen drove us into the city on their bikes to get the appropriate materials for the evening’s on-campus lakeside party.

Caroline was late getting back because, we found out later, she decided to buy flowers. We were getting a little worried when she and her ride didn’t come back. Meanwhile, a quiet rumor was spreading throughout the girls’ wing that these four wild girls found a mysterious motorcycle gang of strangers and that one girl got abducted. I guess with everyone being locked up, they were eager for a juicy story.

Let’s review: motorcycles, incredibly fast and crowded Indian traffic, New Year’s Eve lakeside party with new friends. To say this was the best night of my life would be the understatement of the century.

In the meantime, I’ve been learning how to eat with only my right hand and without silverware. An unleavened bread called roti or poori (pictured is a small type of poori) is torn into pieces and used to pick up the food, usually some spiced veggie sauce served over rice. Lots of biryani. Lots of curry, lots of peppers. The food is consistently fantastic. Plus, the caf makes everything fresh, including their juice. This morning for breakfast we had fresh pineapple juice. Oh.my.goodness.

Dress really surprised me here. I figured since it was a city that there would have been a lot more westernized clothing. Men, young and old, wear pants and button up shirts, just like the west. Women, on the other hand, wear primarily saris and salwars. So I went shopping. And the rupee is something like 45 to the dollar.

I’m taking a lot of really great classes. I’m really excited to learn a language; Conversational Hindi is offered through SIP, and one of my friends offered to teach me Arabic. I’ll also be taking classes from the main catalogue, including Aspects of Indian Modernity (a literature course), Approaches to Acting, and an independent study of either kuchipudi or bharatnatyam dance (YouTube them! They’re amazing!) I met a few theatre students the other day. We’re the same everywhere—I knew before they spoke to me they were actors, haha!

I’m also getting used to Standard Indian Time. This means when they say one minute, they mean an hour. When they say 11:30 prompt, they mean 1:00. Classes rarely start on time, and the kuchipudi/bharatnatyam performance scheduled for 7:30 began at about 7:55. The campus shuttle runs on schedule at a quarter to every hour. That is, on the days it decides to come at all.

 And whoever said that India has monkeys like we have squirrels wasn’t kidding. Macaques are rampant.