Keleshwari Mela!

Last Friday Becka and I went to the Keleshwari Mela! It's a mela, or fair, for the Adivasi people. Dr. Devy, the founder of my NGO thought it would be nice if they could get together and share their traditional dances and performing arts with each other.

We were very excited to go and we even got up at 6AM! We started off in jeep for the four hour ride to Keleshwari in Panchmahal. It was a very eventful ride with Vipul singing in the back and everyone teasing Manish about how he never talks about his wife. Everytime we mentioned her name he would take his scarf and put it around his ears so he couldn't hear us. On the way, we stopped to watch a giant truck burning. Ironically, it was carrying matches. It was a HUGE fire and every once in awhile there would be a random explosion coming out the sides. There was a great big crowd and when the police and fire department finally came we continued on our way.

When we arrived, people were just arriving. We explored the old step wells and temples scattered around. We were reading the little plaques that were around to explain what each of the ruins were. One of them was describing the "mother-in-law well" and it said, "There is no historical significance to this well." We thought it was funny that the people writing the plaques and in charge of preserving it thought it was insignificant.

Very soon, all the different dances and performances began. It was really fun to walk around from dance to dance and just watch. When I was photographing a dance I heard a small voice go, "Jeni Behen?" and it was our children from the Tejgadh school! We were so happy they were there. They were there to enjoy the mela and to perform their own dance. I must say, without bias, that they did very well. It was kind of hot out and some of them were wearing their sweaters while dancing in the hot sun. Afterwards I was talking to Fender and he was dripping with sweat and I asked if he was hot and he was like, "hunh!" (yes) but he still wouldn't take off his sweater!

We were sitting around when we met Snake Boy. His name wasn't Snake Boy, it started with an N, but I don't remember it now. He had a little baby python in his shirt pocket and would just casually pull it out and play with it. We followed him to the snake charmer and they pulled out all their snakes for us. It was really cool and scary. They made me and Becka hold the baby python. We were too scared to be close to the cobra, so we just looked and took pictures from afar. Then Snake Boy took the python and put it in his mouth! The snake charmer actually was affiliated with Bhasha as well. Many animal rights activists were against snake charmers because they thought it was cruel to the snakes, but then all the snake charmers would lose their livelihoods and their craft would be lost. So to compromise, the snake charmers donate snake venom to the venom banks so if someone gets bitten there will be an antidote. We promised him that we would send him the pictures we took. Snake Boy was really cool. He was really friendlybut not in a creepy or pushy way and he was really mature for his age.

Afterawhile, the heat, sun, and waking up at 6AM started catching up with us. We were looking for more water but all the water that was being sold was from large metal tubs sold by children. We didn't think it was wise to drink it. We had lunch on leaves that were sown together and then wandered around more. We saw some people cracking open coconuts and drinking the milk, so we bought some coconuts. We didn't really know how to crack them open and were kind of embarassed about trying in front of everyone. Snake Boy came over with a baby and sat next to us, just hanging out. Finally, we asked Nita to help us crack open our coconuts and we got the few precious sips. Not fully satisfied we bought some mosambis (they're like oranges) and ate them inside the step wells to cool off.

We were very tired when we left but it was an awesome day. We saw so many different dances and the costumes were great. The women had brilliant saris on and bangles all up and down their arms. The men had turbans on and bow and arrows. Everyone was having so much fun dancing around and watching.

Veguma

Although I had such a bad night before, the next day was simply amazing. I went with a couple professors to visit a village called Veguma. It was about two hours away, half of which was on a terrbile dirt road with lots of pointy rocks sticking up out of it. I really thought we were going to pop a tire, but miraculously, we made it. Just when we thought we had made it to the most remote and isolated village, we just kept driving through to another village that was even more remote and isloated. Two of the children, Fender and Kuman, came with us because they came from the village. It was really beautiful there. It was very hilly and brown. The land was very barren, but then there were palm trees sticking up everywhere. It looked like a scene from The Lorax by Dr. Seusse when they cut down all the trees to make thneeds.

We had a big meeting and the professor and his students were all talking to the villagers. They were asking about their dialect and different words and such. Since I'm working on a sickle cell report, I asked if anyone knew about it and no one had. We also asked if they had a doctor. They said a doctor came "regularly" and when we asked how regularly, they said once a year. One woman had a goitre on her neck and we told her about the free clinic at Tejgadh, but I was wondering if and how she would ever get there. It was incredibly difficult for us to travel to and from and we had a car and everything.

I also got to meet Fender's father and Kuman's mother and father. Fender was really cute and acting like a proper ambassador/interpreter. He says he's about nine years old, but I think he's at least eleven. I told him I really liked his village and that it was really beautiful in Hindi and then he responded, "Really? What's the name of my village?" He totally called me out. I was like, "Uhhh...... Vey...gnumsthdidigioajgi?" But the proper name of the village is Veguma and about 8 children at our school come from that village.

It was really eye opening to see the village that they came from. There are about 750 people living in the village and most of them are farmers, but it's not very profitable because the land is so hilly and stony. The crops did look a little pitiful compared to the lush, green fields near Tejgadh. All the women are illiterate, although now some of the girls go to school. They have a government school and an unofficial school but each only go up to the 4th grade. If they want further education, they have to travel for about an hour to get to the next school. They don't really have a proper road leading up to their village because the land belongs to the Forestry department, even though there are hardly enough trees to make a forest, and they won't allow a proper road to be built. But they do have electricity, which is nice. I would really like to visit more of the surrounding villages. I was really an amazing day.

The Princess and the Fleas

Last week there was a musical workshop for all the little village children at the academy. About seven musicians came and taught the children how to play their traditional Adivasi instruments. The kids really liked it. Really. They'd be playing with these instruments for like 8 hours a day and they wouldn't stop. Even at night when they could be running around and playing, they'd be beating the dol and blowing on their flutes. Believe me, it was really cool when they'd be playing at 7 AM and I was trying to sleep.

I stayed over at the village for two nights. The first night was fine, but the second night was the worst night of my life. I was sleeping on a matteress on the floor, which was cool, except that there were all these bed bugs crawling all over me. It was so gross! I could feel them and they kept biting me. I couldn't sleep because everytime I drifted off, one of the little buggers would take a chomp at my back. Now, it looks like I have a bright red rash around my torso, but it's really just hundreds of bug bites put together. And it's so itchy! Ugh!

The bed bugs were just the beginning. I was trying to sleep and twitching everytime I felt a bug when I heard some scampering and then FELT some scampering on my covers NEAR MY FACE! A mouse had run up on my mattress NEAR MY FACE. I freaked out and threw my sheets off and I heard it scamper away. Everytime I made some noise, I heard it scamper farther away. Gross! Luckily, there was a pile of mattresses nearby, so I slept on top of a pile of about ten mattesses. It was like I was the princess in the fairy tale The Princess and the Pea. You know that story, when they test to see if the girl is an actual princess by seeing if she can feel a pea at the bottom of a pile of mattresses. Except instead of a test, I was sleeping on a bunch of mattresses to get away from mice NEAR MY FACE and instead of a pea, I had a bunch of fleas to keep me up. You know, I bet that's how the story really goes. A girl was trying to get away from mice that were scampering NEAR HER FACE and being kept up by fleas crawling all over her and biting her (a very valid explanation, believe me, I feel her pain) and somebody just assumed it was her being prissy and princessy. (And when I say "someboy" I mean "a stupid boy")

The next morning, I was very grouchy from being kept up all night and worried that I might have lice. So I went to talk to one of the doctors, and he said I had lice! But I think he mistook my gray hairs as a lice infestation. But I didn't want to take any chances so I bought the shampoo and furiously used it.

On the way home I was feeling very glum and thinking about being Dirty Lice Girl. I was thinking that I wouldn't be able to have contact with anyone for the next two weeks and that this was probably how Rogue feels from X-Men. You know how she has that power to suck the living energy from people, so she can't touch anyone? And I was wondering whether I would rather be a mutant or Dirty Lice Girl. I mean, on one hand, if I was a mutant, I would have a power instead of parasites. On the other hand, if I was Dirty Lice Girl, I would have to power to get rid of my lice, at least I was praying that I would have the power to get rid of my lice. But the next day I spoke to the other doctor and he said I didn't have lice!!!! I wasn't itching my head and all my bites were bug bites, not lice bites. So I don't have lice!! I was so relieved. But as a precaution, I still boiled all my clothes. I hope they all die.

Century!

Last Wednesday I went to a cricket match! The match was between India and the West Indies and it was very exciting. I thought it was going to be boring since cricket matches are for about eight hours long and they just keep bowling and nothing exciting seems to happen, but it was really fun!

India was up to bat first. We missed the first hour of the match because we couldn't wake up that early. (The match started at 9AM! Who wakes up at that ungodly hour?) But anyways, India did very well and we got to see some great batting. Dhoni got three six's! That means he hit the ball right out of the boundary and got an automatic six runs. And we got to see the great Sachin Tendulkar bat. He's like the Babe Ruth of India, except he's still alive and playing. Apparently, he's been in a slump lately. But not this match! He was able to reach a century! That means that he was able to score one hundred runs and when the total score was 341, you can see why reaching a century is such a big deal. It was very dramatic because he did it on his last bowl.

The second half of the match was a bit more boring. The West Indies didn't really do well and the great Brian Lara got out on like the third bowl. I was kind of dissapointed because I really wanted to see him play since everyone talks about him so much. But it was really cool to see them make all the wickets. Poor West Indies, couldn't even make it to 200 runs.

It was really fun sitting in the crowd and cheering for India. I wore my India cricket team shirt and everyone around was waving Indian flags. Everytime an Indian cricket player looked in our direction, the crowd went wild and started cheering. The next day I was talking to our landlord's kids. They are so cute! And we were discussing the match and I felt so cool because I actually knew what they were talking about. I mean really, I saw Sachin reach a century!