India…OMG

India. It defies description. Like music, or love, or the color red, explaining doesn’t quite do it; you have to experience it to understand it. I arrogantly thought that after four months of traveling independently in Southeast Asia and hearing tales from Jordan and other travelers, I was ready for what India could dish out. I was so, so wrong.

India is visceral. It plugs right into your brain stem and turns all the knobs WAY up. The sights, the sounds, the smells — best way I can describe it is to put you on a street in Calcutta.

First, there’s the smell. It’s a mix of trash, body odor, exhaust fumes, exotic cooking spices, animal and human waste, and heady cigarette smoke. As Jordan told me, “You could put me on a plane blindfolded, and I’d know I was in India from that smell.”

 

Then, there are the sounds. People shouting, haggling, or discussing the morning paper, dogs barking, chai-wallahs hawking for business, and what sounds like hundreds of drivers all leaning on their horns. This must be what the word “cacophony” was made for.

 

And before you’ve even opened your eyes, you can feel the heat. It’s oppressive — 100 degrees and 80% humidity under a baking sun.

 

Got all that? Now open your eyes and start walking. The first thing you’ll notice is all the garbage. Piled up on the sidewalks, in the middle of the streets, filling up gutters. It’s everywhere. (And we’ve been told that Calcutta is a comparatively clean city!) There are also other generally grody things that you have to watch out for. I started thinking of it as hazmat hopscotch — take a leap over a dead rat or a long detour around a puddle of dubious origin.

 

Within a few seconds, you’ll probably be approached by a beggar. Dirty children with runny noses, hard-faced women holding listless babies, crippled men with missing legs or deformed hands will flock to you. We have a policy of not giving to beggars, and instead give our alms to reputable charities or good-cause shops.  And there are so many of them — the sheer amount of need is overwhelming and you can’t know if the money you give actually goes to the beggars or some syndicate they’re working for.  Still, you feel like a Dickensian villain as you walk away. The amount of poverty here gave us an entirely new appreciation for the work of Mother Theresa, who dedicated her life to serving the slum dwellers of Calcutta. Her legacy lives on at Mother House, a place for volunteers, many of whom where staying at our guesthouse, to continue her work.

You might come across a spontaneous cricket match being played by local kids on the street, traffic zooming around them, joyfully uncaring of the taxis breaking through their field of play or that relentless sun. While you’re watching, you might have a stranger come up to shake your hand and strike up a conversation: “Nice beard! (To Jordan) What is your country, good sir?”

You’ll keep going, noting all the gorgeous saris and tunics the women wear here. When they move by you en masse, swaddled in yards of embroidered silk and loaded with gold jewelry, it’s like being caught in the middle of a flock of exotic birds.

This city ramble has turned out to be a bit more than you bargained for. You haven’t really noticed the architecture, the confusing knots of electrical wires overhead, or even what most of the stores are selling, because you’re too busy dodging taxis, rickshaws, and stray dogs, playing hazmat hopscotch, and fighting a losing battle against the heat to notice. You need a break, so you head to an air-conditioned sweet shop nearby. As you approach, there are three painfully thin people lying prone on the sidewalk, their faces covered in flies. The bile rises in your throat and you say a prayer to God that they’re simply sleeping and you didn’t just walk over a dead body.

A few blocks later you walk into a cheerful, prosperous old sweet shop, something straight out of Mary Poppins. You sit down at a window facing the street, weary in every sense. A beautiful Indian woman in a turquoise sari embroidered with tangerine flowers walks up to the window, points at you, and mouths “pretty.”

India’s like that: appalling to astonishing in a minute.

One day, our guesthouse owner, Harry, invited us to his 6 am yoga class at the Maidan, the big city park. We did our stretches with elderly Indian men who welcomed us like honored guests, with Victoria Memorial and the steeple of St. Paul’s just over the treeline. The park was jammed with people exercising, playing cricket, or just out for a stroll. I realized this is the only time of day it’s really bearable to be outside.

 

Then Harry took us to meet his friends for breakfast. We ate dhokla (tastes like jalapeño cornbread), idli (a steamed rice cake with coconut chutney), a meat-stuffed friend dumpling whose name we forget and many cups of chai. We liked the dhokla so much, Harry took us to the bakery that made it. The people in line started chatting us up, bringing us plate after plate of things to try. “Do you like it?” “Do you have this in America?” “How can you eat all this food? You must go to the gym!” Another man started philosophizing on food with us: “Fresh food brings life. Old food brings death. That’s the problem with the West, too much packaged food, not enough fresh food!” Amen, brother! Then he handed us a bright orange, sticky, sweet, fried dough shaped like a pretzel called a jelabi. “It’s fat free, the fat is free!” It was one of the best days of our whole trip.

The next day we got our first illness of the trip, and it packed a wallop. Fever, disagreeable Indian food … let’s just say that night at the Calcutta train station I hit a new personal low.

This place gives me whiplash. It can be gorgeous as a sunset, welcoming as an old friend, and completely charming. Jordan loves it, of course. It’s a mark of his optimistic character and loyal heart that he adores the place, warts and all. But I simply don’t know if I can see past the squalor, filth, and misery. Love it or hate it, India demands to be taken on its own terms. I’m still deciding whether they’re terms I’m willing to live with.