First Impressions
Mumbai Airport, 1:30 pm
(back-dated entry #2, while on the plane from Mumbai to Cochin)
After our bagage debacle (more on that later), we had to get from International Arrivals to Domestic Departures, which it seems are on opposite sides of the city. To do this, we had to take a pre-paid cab through Mumbai (or, if you like, Bombay). Based solely on that 15 minute cab ride, India so far is everything I've heard it was. It's hot. It's humid. It's dirty. It smells. It's loud. It's crowded. It's amazing. Even though all the structures were either brown or gray or covered with dust, the clothes and signs and billboards were vibrant technicolor. the sacred and the profane exist in such close proximity that it's hard to tell the difference. On a building's concrete facade, Hindu deities and campaigning politicians vie for space. On the street below, a man unzips his pants and relieves himself directly into the open sewer system. Like i said, it smells. Once outside the airport buildings, one is knocked senseless by the smell (if it's possible to be knocked senseless by sensory overload...); the smell of waste, of people, of wasted people. Yes, discarded trash and people line the streets of Mumbai. Nestled against the outer walls of the airport was an improvisational town composed of tents made from plastic tarps, where naked children cavorted with stray dogs. Women sat on the ground in a semi-circle, happily talking about whatever it is women talk about when they sitin a semi-circle. I've spent plenty of time in various US cities, done mission work with some of the porest of America's poor. But I've never been confronted with poverty so blatant- so out-in-the-open-- or so prevalent before. I can only interpret these signs to say "get used to it. this is simply the way it is." And i'm not trying here to suggest that poverty and oppression as the status quo are acceptable. In a culture where these things have been entrenched so firmly for so long, the struggle for change is going to be that much harder.
But I'm not here to fight.
I'm not here to impose my ideals and ideas of Good and Bad, Right and Wrong onto Indian culture.
I'm here to observe, to experience, to share in that culture. and with God's grace, I'll be able to be open and receptive to what this culture has to teach me, and learn to work for change-- not to fight for it.
Mumbai Airport, 1:30 pm
(back-dated entry #2, while on the plane from Mumbai to Cochin)
After our bagage debacle (more on that later), we had to get from International Arrivals to Domestic Departures, which it seems are on opposite sides of the city. To do this, we had to take a pre-paid cab through Mumbai (or, if you like, Bombay). Based solely on that 15 minute cab ride, India so far is everything I've heard it was. It's hot. It's humid. It's dirty. It smells. It's loud. It's crowded. It's amazing. Even though all the structures were either brown or gray or covered with dust, the clothes and signs and billboards were vibrant technicolor. the sacred and the profane exist in such close proximity that it's hard to tell the difference. On a building's concrete facade, Hindu deities and campaigning politicians vie for space. On the street below, a man unzips his pants and relieves himself directly into the open sewer system. Like i said, it smells. Once outside the airport buildings, one is knocked senseless by the smell (if it's possible to be knocked senseless by sensory overload...); the smell of waste, of people, of wasted people. Yes, discarded trash and people line the streets of Mumbai. Nestled against the outer walls of the airport was an improvisational town composed of tents made from plastic tarps, where naked children cavorted with stray dogs. Women sat on the ground in a semi-circle, happily talking about whatever it is women talk about when they sitin a semi-circle. I've spent plenty of time in various US cities, done mission work with some of the porest of America's poor. But I've never been confronted with poverty so blatant- so out-in-the-open-- or so prevalent before. I can only interpret these signs to say "get used to it. this is simply the way it is." And i'm not trying here to suggest that poverty and oppression as the status quo are acceptable. In a culture where these things have been entrenched so firmly for so long, the struggle for change is going to be that much harder.
But I'm not here to fight.
I'm not here to impose my ideals and ideas of Good and Bad, Right and Wrong onto Indian culture.
I'm here to observe, to experience, to share in that culture. and with God's grace, I'll be able to be open and receptive to what this culture has to teach me, and learn to work for change-- not to fight for it.
posted by Andy at 1:30 PM
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