Friends, Americans, Countrymen

I’ve been by myself for so long that I had almost forgotten what other college-age Americans are like. Thankfully, the group of MSU students that has just arrived here reminded me how much fun they can be. They also have revealed to me something about the Hindi that I had been learning, and the seven of us together are learning how to make do with some necessities. It’s been an eventful first few days.

It started with everybody arriving at the house at 6 A.M. on Wednesday, thirsty for chai and desperately needing some hardcore rest after an all-night journey on a train and a bus, as well as a minor ER visit. Lakin apparently got rather sick on the first train ride from Mussoori to Pathankot, and they took him to a local hospital in Pathankot for a little bit of IV rejuvenation. It took a lot out of everybody, and after they had finished their chai, they all took to their respective beds and passed out for at least three hours. Shammi asked me if they would want breakfast at 8:30. Not a chance. Sleep first; food later.

The rest of the day consisted of unpacking and relaxing, with some lunch and dinner involved. This is when I found out that my Hindi learning over the past several months has been a little bit… how shall we say? Biased? Yeah, that’s a good PC word for it. I never took any Hindi classes, so all of the Hindi that I’ve learned has been by ear, from the people around me. I got really good at communicating with them and figuring out their pronunciation, how they use vowels and some common catchphrases.

The other MSU students, on the other hand, spent their first Indian week at a renown language school in Mussoori, learning “standard” Hindi. When they got here, I was using some of the Hindi that I knew to communicate with GSC staff, and also to see how their Hindi was progressing. Apparently, people in this region speak Hindi a little bit differently than in central India, or as compared to “standard” Hindi. Some phrases that I used were completely unintelligible to the other students. I guess that I learned a sort of a “country” dialect of Hindi. It would be like somebody from India travelling to northern U.S. states and saying “How y’all doin’ today, folks?” Yes, my friends, I learned how to speak hick Hindi. But hey, at least the people around here understand me pretty easily. That’s good enough for me.

Their first day here got even more interesting when the water stopped coming into the house around dinnertime. I guess that’s what happens when 7 people try to start living in one place. So no water to clean dishes at dinner (we had to use a bucket), and most of the new arrivals, fresh off a 12-hour journey, were not able to take a shower. Drinking water was limited as well, and all of those restrictions on an unusually hot and muggy day were not really fun. After breakfast, there really was no water at all, so the kitchen’s a mess and can’t be cleaned. I hate a dirty kitchen. Oh, and the main line is out, and it’s a holiday, so the city plumber won’t be coming anytime soon.

The upside of that is that we can’t take showers in the bathroom. Yes, it’s an upside, at least for males, because it only takes five minutes to walk to a gorgeous little set of pools fed by a river coming from the mountains. The water is clear and cool, and it’s a much more relaxing bathing experience than taking a bucket bath in your bathroom. Wade, Atul and I went today, and we certainly will be going back. That is, of course, as long as you’re not afraid of snakes. I saw one running away from us in that pool, but we went upstream just in case.

But of course, the best part of the day was dinner. Sitting down with a bunch of other Americans who have similar backgrounds as me was a truly great experience. After over four months of being alone in many respects, it was great to have some more people to talk to. The fact that I was able to use American English is just a bonus.