Breathtaking Day in Goa

I never thought I'd write a blog post about a single day, but after Monday I just couldn't help it. I suppose there's a first time for everything. From this (extended) weekend's dates of December 2 - 5, I was in a state of bliss relaxing in the cozy state of Goa. But this trip was a little different from typical trips to the tourist laden location.

For those of you who don't know, Goa is a small state which was ruled by Portugal until the 1960's when it joined with the recently liberated India in freedom. My and my buddies from the program make it a habit to take a weekend visit there every few weeks or so. The past two trips have been to Baga beach, located on the northern end of the state's coast and heavily traveled by Indian tourists. After feeling a little fed up with the overcrowded restaurants and clubs, we made the executive decision to head for a entirely different destination: south Goa. After a restless but routine journey in an overnight sleeper bus, my friend Nick and I rented a motorcycle (yes, parents, it happened) from the town of Margoa and took a open air drive to Palolem beach. After a initially scary period of driving a manual bike, on the left side of the road, in Indian traffic (I've never done any of those things, much less all at once), I couldn't believe how beautiful the drive was, much less how thrilling it was to drive that beast of a bike.

In any case, the most breathtaking day of the trip came on Monday, my and Taylor's last day. Four of us: Taylor, Amy, Robert and myself took two bikes and drove the roads of South Goa for almost the entire day. This is where I reach the point where I cannot even begin to describe to you how full of joy this journey made me. Somehow seeing the never-ending beaches, eye popping greenery and feeling the rush of wind on my face on that bike just don't translate to ink on a page or pixels on a screen. I guess this is all to say that sometimes, life is just indescribable (or inconceivable) and unfortunately in some ways I just won't be able to tell you what my semester was like here in India. Yes, I can tell where I went, what I saw, what I did and what I ate. I can't tell what it felt like to have my chest swell with excitement at the sight of a deserted beach, or how a lunch of fresh fish and chips under the palm trees compelled me to stay in that inspiring state. Too often these sights, sounds and smells have made my experience in India, and to be honest, I'm not sure how to express them. This is the paradox, the tension, the joy and frustration of traveling.

By days end we made it to a totally deserted, clean and seemingly endless beach. I'm not even sure of the name, but that's how untamed this place was. It was not unlike what you see idealized on American TV: amazing food, cheap alcohol and not a cloud in the sky. If I make it back to India, I refuse to leave without returning to that place!


I just entered the Alliance's photo contest, here are the photos I submitted. I have a pretty terrible camera and have done zero editing, but these are my best shots of the semester so don't make fun! Peace.

The moments are slipping away...

As I spend my last three weeks in this country, I have the remnants of recently formed thoughts and ideas swirling around in my head. In order to process all this activity I try to spend more time alone than is usual for me. During these moments, I have attempted to understand all the sights, sounds and smells which I have been constantly bombarded with for almost four months. Like most who study abroad, I am inevitably going to come home with more questions than answers.

Before I left for India, I felt those around me propping me up with countless words of advice. I have tried to take those words and make my time in the subcontinent as meaningful as I can. For that advice I am eternally grateful. Yet all the guidance in the world could not have prepared me for what has likely been my greatest struggle.

I can only imagine the joy I will share with friends and family after my return to the U.S., and I want my shared memories and experience to be part of that. Yet somehow, no matter how I try, I can't capture every moment. Taking pictures, journaling, and phoning home are all part of my regular activity but I know that at the end of the day, those who weren't with me on this wild journey will never truly understand what I did in the fall of 2011. What will be treasured memories have flown by, waiting for none. I am helpless in that regard, this I know. But India has taught me that the only solution to reaping the most from life is to live every minute of it in that moment. I now know what it means to live as if every moment is your last. Granted, I may not do my best at living this way everyday, but I know what it takes. I would say to my friends and family and especially those I care about the most, that you cannot take life week to week or day to day. It goes by too fast. Instead, take it minute by minute, carefully considering your every word and action. On then may we live life to the fullest, without regret or remorse.

These pictures are from my recent trip to Mumbai to see a cricket game (Indian vs. West Indies) and a cycle exibition put on by my host mom's brother.On the way to Mumbai I went on an overnight train in sleeper class. There was hardly room to stand during trip's duration of 1 to 5 at night. I slept through some of the 8 hour test match needless to say. After four more days of play, it ended in a draw. HA. O cricket...

 

Travel Week

Wow it has been way too long since I've posted on here. I apologize to everyone who thought I might have died. Since it has been so long since I've written anything, I thought I'd give you guys a taste of my recent travels and activities, along with some ballin pictures. So last week (Oct 22-31) was our travel week. Groups of five or so students in the program had the opportunity to travel around India and get a feel for other parts of the country.  Four others and I left at 3 AM on Saturday to fly to Varanasi. This may sound like a routine flight, but let me tell you, it was quite the opposite. We had a driver pick us up that morning bright and early. Unfortunately, he had to drive around to each of our houses and pick us up individually. Even more unfortunately, Hilary (one of the girls in our group) was not answering her phone and we didn't know where her house was. We rightly assumed she was out cold. With huge pangs of regret, we felt we had no choice but to rush to the airport without her, lest all of us miss our flight. We checked in and queued up for security at the Pune airport, all the while attempting to contact sleeping Hilary.  Somehow (I'm really still not sure how this happened), we got a hold of her and sadly admitted that she wasn't likely to make the flight. She was determined to try in any case, called our driver, and rushed to the airport. She got there in record time and I'm pretty certain that she cut every line possible in that airport to get through security. I don't know how it happened and I honestly think there was some direct intervention from God going on there. In any case, against all odds she made it on the flight to Varanasi.
While in Varanasi we took a boat on the Ganges (the holiest river in India), rode horses on its banks, went shopping and saw a lot of temples and museums. We also ate some delicious pizza and I had the most delicious apple pie and ice cream I think I've ever had. And yes, we did eat Western food from time to time on this trip. In fact, this might have been the most tourist-like experience I've had yet. I should also mention exactly what the river Ganges is like. This is by far the dirtiest body of water I have ever witnessed in my life. Indians live all across its banks and depend on it for their daily needs. The stench of the river cannot be escaped almost anywhere in Varanasi. Hindus believe that bathing in the Ganges is spiritually purifying, no matter the pollution, and takes away the sins of the bather. We were able to witness several religious ceremonies performed at the banks of the river as well. One of them is performed every night and is accompanied by music and dance. Others include the burning of corpses at the Burning Ghat.  We stopped to watch several bodies on pyres with several hundred Indians crowded around to watch. There was even a box containing a deceased person which had been shipped all the way from Bangalore (South India) to be burned. The idea is that, for Hindus, the burning of the body and spreading of the ashes on the river (I told you it was dirty) guarantee residence in heaven. Certain individuals who are considered pure aren't even burned, but are simply floated down the river. These deceased individuals include children under six months, priests, pregnant women, those with leprosy, and those with snake bites. In fact, the first thing we did when arrived consisted of climbing to the roof of our hotel, looking out, and witnessing some plaid floating on the Ganges... In any case, after two nights in the holiest city in India, we were ready to move on.
Next, we took an overnight train to Agra. The train ride was very enjoyable as we all were able to stay in the same cabin and I slept well. Several Indians wanted to have in depth conversations in Hindi and take pictures with us, but nothing new there. By the way, Indians love taking pictures with foreigners (I think its just white people though). Don't ask me why. My guess is they have "who-has-the-most-pictures-with-whites" contests with all their friends.
In case you didn't know, the Taj Mahal resides in Agra and was simply mindblowing. I won't talk too much about it as I believe the pictures speak for themselves.
We then had a driver who took us to Jaipur which is a five hour drive to the west in the state of Rajasthan. There we saw several forts and temples, along celebrating the Diwali festival. Diwali lasts three days and is celebrated by buying completely unsafe fireworks and letting your toddlers set them off without a shred of supervision or instruction. Needless to say, we saw a couple fire trucks screaming through the city once night time hit.  Our hotel was absolutely amazing in Jaipur and we were able to have dinner on the roof every night and enjoy the fireworks. The last dinner we had was at the Om Revolving Restaurant which was exactly that. The live music and 360 view of the sprawling city with fireworks in every direction made for a relaxing dinner.
The next morning the rest of the group went ahead of me to Jodphur while I flew to Goa to save some money for the weekend.  Goa was typical Goa: relaxing on chairs on the beach for two days straight while having cheap food and alcohol brought to you. Just what I needed.
So that about sums up my travel week. Right now, two of my classes have ended so my schedule consists of Hindi class, Contemporary India, and my internship. My internship is at Ascent Informatics which is a software development company with about 25 employees. I have been enjoying it more and more, but there is very little direction in my work and I get the feeling I'm doing nothing of significance. I wouldn't be too worried about it under normal circumstances, however I'm going to need to write a paper and present on everything I will have done in the next few weeks. I'm sure I'll think of something to write on that's not too techy...
Enjoy the pictures!

 A museum in Varanasi dedicated to ancient religious relics.

 The Japanese Buddhist temple at Varanasi.

 Not sure what this is...but its cool

 Hindi

 More Buddhist temple...

 Shiva temple, we couldn't take pictures of the inside

 There are some tight alleys in Varanasi around the river.

 Taj Mahal

 Beautiful

 The Wind Palace

 Amber Fort

 The Floating Palace...couldn't go out there

 Jantar Mantar, a collection of astronomical instruments

 Diwali festival in Jaipur

Religion (I'm going to offend someone, somewhere...)

I think I could study Hinduism for the next twenty years and not consider myself an expert. This stuff is really hard to understand for a variety of reasons. Everyone seems to have a different take on it. Often one can get multiple, conflicting responses to the same questions. And if it wasn't hard enough, there are 300,000,000 gods and goddesses, so one always feels their knowledge of the religion is severely lacking. Also, how people interact with the religion is extremely different. Indians with whom I have conversed on this subject have given a range of responses towards Hinduism, ranging from devout, to nominal, to complete skeptic and atheist. I suppose this aspect of the religion is similar to Christianity in the United States.
As I have mentioned before, "festival season" is in full swing here, accompanied by many Hindu traditions. A couple of posts ago, I mentioned that the Ganpati festival was happening. Just the other day was Dassera. In just two weeks, travel week will be upon us, along with the Diwali festival. All of these festivals are associated with a variety of gods and goddesses as well as their mythology. I don't understand each of these in depth to really give a helpful understanding of what each represents. However,  I can tell you that Ganpati celebrates Ganesh, who is elephant headed son of Shiva and Parvathi. He was created when his mother, Parvathi, needed to leave the house for a bath. So she used her powers to create Ganesh and told him to guard the house and not let anyone come in. While his mother was gone, Shiva (Parvathi's wife) showed up at the door of his house and was confronted by Ganesh. Shiva became so angry that Ganesh would not allow his entrance into his own home that he chopped off Ganesh's head. Parvathi came back and was very distraught to find her new son headless. She then told Shiva he must replace Ganesh's head with a head of the first animal he saw, which happened to be an elephant. Hence, Ganesh has an elephant head. He is worshiped very commonly in Maharastra (my state) and is prayed to for wisdom, removal of obstacles, and lots of other stuff.
In any case, I've been to a basement church (Christian) for about two weeks now and I'm loving it. I haven't been able to attend regularly because the program, and sometimes I, have been scheduling activities for the entire weekend. The church contains a meager congregation of about forty, with a small audio setup. I've been using my media resources skills to help them set up every week, which has been a blast. Its amazing how God has provided me with skills and opportunities which I'm able to use in the future to glorify Him. The church only sings Western songs and hymns, which is accompanied by a service completely in English. Even before and after the service, all the Indians are talking to one another in English, not Hindi or Marathi (the state's local language). I find this extremely tragic. It seems that in bringing Christianity to the subcontinent, the gospel could not be separated from the Western culture and English language of its bearers. Granted, it is believed that Thomas (the doubting guy) first brought the good news to India, however these are the circumstances as it is seen today.
Like many Christians, I believe that a large task in the mission of the church is to spread the good news to all corners of the earth. However, I believe implicit in this task is the sometimes more difficult task of adapting some understandings of the gospel to those which are relevant to respective cultures. Do not get me wrong, I am not advocating the compromise of any central truths of the Christian faith. However, I am saying that certain imagery and other literary devices are used in the Scriptures as well as in our tradition which is (or was) culturally relevant to their/our respective times and places. To give an example, missionaries have long struggled with the question of how to translate the Scriptures to new found languages. I would make the argument that translating those Scriptures has just as much to do with language as it does with culture.  In the same way English words carry significantly different meanings between the United States and Pune, India, imagery can have different, or even opposite, meaning. Correct translation of the entire institution of Christianity can not only make biblical images more relevant to the people, it can also lay the foundation for a much stronger church; a foundation which is built in cooperation with the cultural understanding of the time. Again, this mission may be accomplished without compromising the empowering message of the gospel in any way.
Now that I've got that out of my system, I have to mention how biblical images have become more relevant to me since being here. Jesus' washing of the disciples feet has so much more meaning after walking the filthy streets of Pune in sandals day after day (in no way to do I mean think that the scene of Jesus' washing of the disciples feet should be translated differently. To advocate this would be to take a more extreme view of the point I'm making). Some days are so bad that, after returning home, I will take the time to wash my feet and toenails, even before eating dinner. Similarly, Paul now seems much more radical when we read, "Blessed are the feet of those who bring the good news" in Romans.  The feet are a sign of uncleanliness in India and I would imagine for most of the third world. No doubt there is a reason for this. However, in the face of this cultural taboo, Paul uses a radical statement to express how life changing the gospel is. Surely this is the reason the Scriptures say that the world will not understand the gospel of Jesus Christ. The world sees the feet as unclean, but through the gospel, this aspect of creation as been redeemed and should be looked on as such.

This is Goa

Eating delicious seafood

Relaxing at Goa

Puppies at Goa

Monkeys...not at Goa (class field trip)

View from Krishna temple

Da temple... of Krishna

about to meditate

That cow had a wild night...

Capture the flag

Dogs on dogs

Maya Fe...soon to be model

This tree is growing through a shop...yea...

Classy

Fatties at Goa