We arrived at JNU campus and it was late, so we decided not to check into our rooms until after dinner.  We were to be the guests of honor at a dinner hosted by the University, and we were all STARVING by this point, and were already late for the dinner, since we had just spent a couple hours trying, unsuccessfully, to track down the lost luggage.

We ditched our stuff in our professor’s room, and walked down to the banquet, where people must have been waiting for hours.  The food smelled amazing, and — though we had had some Indian food on the airplane that really wasn’t bad — this would be our first, officially “Indian” meal, and we were all excited to try it.

The food was amazing.  I’m not sure if it was really that good or just seemed that good because we were famished, but I’m pretty sure this was the best meal of our entire trip.  There were probably about 10 different vegetable curries, plus biryani (fancy rice dish), a basket full of assorted breads, some meat dishes, and lots of fresh fruit and veggies as well.  (Most of us were advised to pass on the fresh fruit and veg, as it may have been washed in tap water, which could make us sick.) Plus, there was wine and beer (Kingfisher!) and filtered water so we wouldn’t get “Delhi Belly.”  We all ate like pigs, I’m sure, except for the unfortunate few in our group who did not like Indian food.  

We got our first chance to talk to Indian people, and the other guests at this dinner were all teachers and delegates to the International Convention that we would be speaking at the next day.  I sat at a table with two Japanese instructors, both beautiful Indian women in traditional saris and jewelry.  We talked about a lot of things, but the thing that struck me the most was that they were very surprised to learn that many people in America question the validity of global warming.  They said that in India, climate change is obvious.  The monsoon seasons are so out-of-whack that entire communities have been abandoned as people move to find new, farmable land.  She said that in her lifetime (she was about 50, at the oldest), monsoons had been pretty consistent in both starting and the approximate amount of rainfall, but that now monsoons start later, and it is hard to guess how much rain they’ll get.  She said that land that was once considered the most valuable farmland was now almost desert-like, and that places that didn’t have good farmland were being used for farming whatever would grow there, because people had to take what they could get.  People who couldn’t afford to move were simply left behind to fend for themselves as best they could.  

Although the conversation wasn’t exactly cheerful, I loved talking to these teachers and hearing their point of view on such a controversial topic.  It’s always good to hear what people outside your “bubble” have to say, and it just affirmed my thinking that Americans have a very “USA-centric” view of everything that goes in on the world.  We don’t give much thought to life outside the USA.  I suppose that’s common of a lot of places, but with all our access to information from around the world, you would think we would have become more global in our thinking by now.

By the time dinner was over and I’d had one glass of wine, I was more than ready for bed.  We were escorted back to the guest house where we were given keys to our rooms.  

I wasn’t expecting much, since these were basically college dorm rooms, but this room made my college dorm room in Holderby Hall at Marshall University look like a suite at the Waldorf Astoria.   In this room, there were two beds, which looked like slightly fancier army cots.  There was a small television set and a busted air-conditioner that looked like they came from the 1960’s, and a tiny bathroom.  In the bathroom, there was a toilet, a sink, a bucket of water, and a few pipes running along the wall.  The rooms were clean, relatively.  I didn’t see any traces of bedbugs, although I did see a few creepy-crawlies on the floor.  The guest house had an open courtyard, so I expected some bugs.  This was India, after all.  I felt disgusting and hadn’t showered for 2 days, so I was more than ready for a shower.  I turned to my roommate and asked, “where’s the shower?”  She shrugged.  After some investigating, we realized that the bucket was the shower.  There was a smaller cup inside the bucket, and you were expected to wash with that.  The larger bucket was your water for the length of your stay.

We were also given one towel to dry off with.  One.  Towel.  As in, one for both of us to use.  Ew.

I’m pretty flexible with things like this, and so was my roommate, Kelly, so we took turns bucket-showering, and I let her have the towel, since she had lost all her luggage.  She was able to bum some clothes and a toothbrush from people in our group, so we were good to go.  We turned on the scary-looking ceiling fan, opened the window, and went to sleep, excited to begin our first full day in India (and hopefully pick up some lost luggage before breakfast!)

- to be continued -