Chennai, India

Oh India. The land where a moped is considered a family vehicle, the smells change from awful to mouth-watering in a matter of seconds, bus capacity is a joke, and cows are a frequent cause for a traffic jam. We explored Chennai up and down and overall, had a cultural experience to last a lifetime. From meditation to auto-rickshaws, we got a taste of it all.

The days leading up to India, we were peppered with comments that to say the least, made us slightly nervous. They prepared us to death with warning about the grime, the smell, the people, the food, everything. We were told horror stories about how people knew of past voyagers who got off the first day, then stayed on the ship the rest of the week. The ship’s crew covered all the carpets (so basically the entire floor of all the public decks) with plastic, and the stairs with cardboard. They closed down all the outside dining areas and the pool deck. They wrapped all the deck furniture with plastic and put away everything from the pool bar. It was like they were preparing for the end of the world. We ported Sunday, March 6th and looked out expecting the worst.

True to expectations, there was a certain cloud of dirt in the air, but what else can be expected from an industrial port loading coal? Dust happens. We ventured out early before we all had to go on our separate trips and took all the precautions they warned against. We nerded it up with the whole passport carrier on the inside of our shirts and were dressed very modestly even with the sweltering heat. We braced ourselves.

What we found, turned out to be very different. Yes, it was a little dusty—driving in the auto-rickshaws for extended periods of time caused a bit of eye irritation—and yes there were certain smells to plug your nose at. But what they didn’t mention was the awesomeness that is the Indian culture. They forgot to highlight all the amazing sights we would see, how traffic weaves in and out in some sort of constructed orchestra, how the disgusting pungent stench would be balanced out by the delicious and fragrant aromas. When warning us about modest attire, they forgot to mention how beautiful the women’s clothing would be. Although some of the younger generation would wear leggings or skinny jeans with a long Indian tunic over, the vast majority of the women wore incredibly vibrant sari’s in multiple styles with millions of colors and patterns. Why couldn’t they have prepared us for this? I thought I wasn’t supposed to like India…but there I went assuming again.

By the time I’m finally posting this blog, we’ve been back on the ship for a week. We’ve already been to Singapore and due to the heartbreaking tragedy in Japan, have switched our itinerary to go to Taiwan instead. I guess, what I’m trying to say is that I’ll try to keep this post shorter than the rest. I want to share my experiences, but I feel like with India, unless you were there, it’s hard to explain. Pictures can’t even do it justice. It’s something you have see, smell, hear, feel, in order to truly slightly understand how my six days in Chennai were.

Breezing over the first day, we went on a city orientation that quite frankly, sucked. We spend five hours on a minimally air conditioned bus with the worst suspension system I’ve ever experienced. Ghana was nothing compared to this. Every time we went over a bump the air was forced out of us making steady breathing nearly impossible. The tour itself consisted of going to an English Fort, two Catholic churches and one Buddhist temple. If I wanted to go see English stuff, I would have gone to England. If I wanted to see churches…well that would never happen so I can just stop right there. The itinerary we were given mentioned nothing of these stops and the trip just should have been renamed “Catholics in Chennai.” Thank god, the temple visit was a least a little reputation saving. We had to take off our shoes to enter and because it was late afternoon, the cement was sooo hot. We walked around for a little while and saw all the worship alters and the sacred cows (I fed one a banana!) and then went back on the bus for the ride home.

That night, we went to the Welcome Reception held at a local hotel for us by some of the University students and other members of the community. They had food for us to try, shopping stations set up, a henna table and then they did a dance performance. The dancers were amazing. They were dressed in full costume and jewelry, as well as makeup. We later learned that the extravagant eyes and lips and to make sure that the audience can see the facial expressions all the way from the back row. It was intense. It must have taken hours to get dressed and ready for that performance and we appreciated it.

From there, we signed out early and a few of us went to a local Hookah bar. Alcohol is uncommon so we indulged in the local social scene at this rooftop place with bean bag chairs and cushioned benches with low tables. We stayed there for a while and then arranged for an auto-rickshaw to take us home.


Day 2

Monday morning was an early one for us as we had to be up and ready to leave at 7:30am for our Art of Living retreat. We got all of our stuff and got on the bus but of course, had to go through the customs at the gate. Each and every time we left or came back, we had to have our passports checked out by the gate security (The night before on our way to the reception, we sat on the bus for 40 minutes before we could even leave the gate waiting for our passports to get checked. Ridiculous. They were so strict there we weren’t allowed to walk through the port and had to take shuttles to and from the ship to the gate.). We waited patiently and then were on our way to make a few stops on the way to the village. We went to Mallalampuram (spelling is awful on that one! Sorry!) and another temple. It was beautiful to see but oh my god it was hot. The sun was just reflecting off all the sand and it was scorching. Impressive, but scorching.  We finally got to the heritage village (I’m not even going to try to spell out that one. Dak something or other), and got a tour and settled into our rooms. Luckily Anna’s room had an extra bed so I got in one with a full bathroom and air conditioning.

We ate lunch and I had my first scare of the trip. The first thing I tasted, my tongue immediately burst into a fit of itches. I had asked him about cashews in any of the dishes before and he said no, no, no, so I made him walk through the line and explain all the ingredients in each dish. He swore there weren’t any nuts so I’m not sure if it was just a reaction to another spice or what but it was quite scary. I stayed clear of the rest of the meal and waited until dinner.

We had our first session with our instructor and learned two breathing techniques and what not. I was so into at that point, giving it my all and really trying to stay with her and do what she said. Some of it was pretty intense and I had to work really hard to keep up.

I had worked up an appetite for dinner by that point and we walked into a traditional Indian sit down dinner in one of the model homes. They set up the low tables and tiny stool chairs all around the center square open courtard in the house. They had candles on each table and we were served on banana leaves. I asked about cashews again and was told there wasn’t anything (via the bobble nod) to worry about. As I was playing with this one thing with my fork, a moved instead to stab another piece and popped it in my mouth just as I overheard the manager saying something about cashews. I spit it out (hadn’t chewed it yet) and after a good two and a half minute freak out, he came over and told me that the thing I had been playing with previously, contained cashews. Awesome. That was in my mouth. Thank god it stayed in the center of the solid piece that I had spit out.  Once again, my meal was over. Between the lack of taste buds for Indian food and the potential death threat, I didn’t eat a whole lot and went to bed fairly hungry.

The morning started early with a sprint around the building and a nice yoga session. After that though, we alternated between the same two breathing techniques (apparently we had to “cleanse our toxins”), her lecturing us, break times and meals garnished with cashews. All the while, we had to sit on the stone floor of this round meditation building on thin straw mats. It was impossible to get comfortable unless you lay down, and it was impossible to stay awake if you lay down. Bad news bears. On top of that, we came back to our room in the evening to find a nasty beady-eyed lizard scurrying around our room. That was pretty much the breaking point. I was hungry, Anna was sick, the lizard was roaming around our sleeping quarters somewhere and we made the executive decision to go home. We left early the next morning and honestly, got more out of driving back via auto-rickshaw for an hour than we would have by staying there for the rest of the time. The culture and sites we saw during the drive made it worth it alone. We went through back villages that we couldn’t have experienced out an air-conditioned bus window/fishbowl. We ate and showered as soon as we got back, followed closely by a nice nap in clean rooms.


Day 4

After eating lunch on the ship and being clean, we went to Spencer Plaza to get some stuff done. We didn’t have any plans really so we let our driver Revi take us to different stores so he would get the commission they gave to drivers for taking SASers there. We stopped by a couple and then asked him where we could get Henna. He took us to this place on the street and we got a mural of artwork done on our arms. It was really difficult to keep them still and not smudged, but it was worth it. We walked into Spencer Plaza. Technically, it’s a mall, but that makes it sound like we wasted a day in a nice shopping center. Spencer Plaza on the otherhand, consists of back alleys, a mixture of stores ranging from high-end to questionable hole-in-the-walls. It was dirty and vibrant and Indian. We got a cultural experience in itself just being there trying to accomplish all of our errands.

I had to buy a cell phone to make my interview call later that night, and that was a task. I had to provide documentation and copies of my passport, India Visa, and have a passport photo just to get my phone and SIM card. I guess in a country where cell phone terrorism isn’t unheard of, precautions to track back the serial numbers are necessary.  It took forever but finally we figured it out.

Later that night, we hunted down the Internet café (only half of the people seemed to know about it), and were able to get on for an hour to upload pictures and do a tri-continent video chat with my roommates, Shehan in Spain, Grace and Cho at home at 250, and Anna and myself in India. It was really fun but I guess they couldn’t see us very well. Anyway, by the time our hour was up, the mall was closed and it was so sketchy to be walking around. The mall was deserted except for a few groups of men walking around. As if Anna and I hadn’t stuck out enough earlier that day, we certainly did then. We found the most populated exit as soon as we could and got a rickshaw to take us back to the ship. It was nice to make it safely home as I could just hear my mom’s voice screaming at me. Sorry mom!

I did some research on the company I was to interview with, and then prepared as much as I could for the phone call to come. I got an hours sleep and then woke up to call Chicago. It was 2:30am my time, and 3:00pm at home and we had about an hour-long conversation and then I got to call home for a bit too. We’ll have to wait and see in April how it went! Wish me luck!

The next day was spent with an SAS trip, University and Indian Home Visit. We got to tour one of the universities and visit with the students. One girl in particular, Sush, was really cool and we hung out for most of the time. They did dances for us and then gave us lunch (minimal cashews this time!) and we had the chance to talk with them and socialize for a while before we went to the home visit portion. The house we went to was really nice, but it was just an older couple that the adults on our trip talked to for the most time. We, the students, just sat there and listened. But we did get to learn how to make those designs they draw with rice flour outside of their doors. It was really hard to even make a straight line!

Natalie and I signed ourselves out early so we could just go straight to T-Nager, another shopping street area, and were walked to an auto-rickshaw when I got chased by a dog! The wild dogs in India are not cute, for starters. They’re mangy and sketchy and not cool. I think it was trying to get my shirt tail but ended up snapping at me. It grazed my leg but thank got didn’t make any contact with skin. It chased me around in circles until the owner came and smacked him. I was shaking for an hour after the incident and would flinch at anything I saw moving from then on.

We got to T-Nager though, and it was like a carnival. The whole street was lit up with neon and flashing lights. The street itself is comprised of regular indoor stores, and then the sidewalks are lined with vendors and stands selling everything from books to clothes to pool toys. It was crazy. In the hour we had to shop (our driver was waiting for us), we got an awesome array of bangles, and found deals on skirts and genie pants. Quite a success before we went back to the ship.

By the time we got back, everyone was meeting in the square to go out. We were starving and had to shower after the day’s activities so we did what we needed to do and then went to meet them at the Hookah bar, Elementz. It was really cool inside. They had all white interior with neon lights around the walls and in the ceiling. It was really sweet and there were a lot of SASers there. We had a good last night before going back with our crazy driver. There were numerous times driving with him that I thought I was going to die even more so than usual. He was hilarious though and had the same laugh as Rifiki from The Lion King. He kept dancing and turning around to talk to us—we’re just like DUDE! THE ROAD! But we made it safe and sound as promised and I’m here typing this today. It really seems though, that the traffic has gotten progressively worse as we work our way around the world. The Bahamas started it off with jam-packed vans, Dominica was next with minimal rules and open containers all over. Brazil was hectic but at least there were lights. Ghana was incredible—between the lack of shock absorbance and no rules, it was crazy. South Africa was civilized but passing was still all over. But this, India. Oh my god. It was nuts!!

The last day Anna and I spent looking for last minute things to buy and what not. We went back to T-Nager but the street vendors were closed for some reason we couldn’t understand. We got a few things including my coolest purchase to date; it needs to be modeled as words don’t do it justice. We still had some time to kill and were hungry so we went back to Spencer Plaza where we once again had Pizza Hut (it was delicious and we had given Indian food a fair try), and got a few last, last minute things. We then got back in our rickshaw for one last ride through Chennai and made it back in plenty of time for on-ship time. Even though this wasn’t the prettiest port to pull out of, we stayed to watch us sail away from India.

As I didn’t go to the Taj on this trip, I’m hoping that one day I’ll be able to go back and visit the beautiful building and cities in the north such as Varanasi and Agra. I’ve heard stories and would love to see the totally different northern culture with my own eyes. Until then, I’ll just concentrate on finishing this voyage around the world.