I, Holly, want to be the first one to write a journal entry on India. It was my idea to spend time in India after all.
October 2007
Northern India
I couldn't believe what I had just seen. A car in front of us had swerved and hit a man, a woman, and a baby that were all on a motorcycle. The car had swerved to avoid hitting a cow. It couldn't be helped that cows were sacred here in India.
Amanda, Jen, and I were watching the scene unfold as we sat in our taxi cab. We were all protesting how we should have helped them, but the driver told us not to.
We were relieved to see that the man, woman, and baby were unharmed, but the person who was driving the car who hit them wasn't so lucky. Everyone around us dropped everything and started to crowd around the unlucky driver who swerved to avoid the cow.
Our driver, Sunil, had explained to us that the driver would receive punishment from everybody around them for hitting the man, the woman, and the baby. I totally saw that as wrong, but it wasn't my place to say anything. This was India and not the United States. Our driver said that the other driver had a chance to drive away and run off, but it was too late. The driver was going to get punishment.
A few days before that, we had arrived by plane in Delhi, India.
After checking into our hotel, we decided to go around for a walk. Seeing three white women walking by themselves was not normal for India. A bunch of guys had bumped (purposely) into us.
After we had gone to a tourist office and obtained maps, we met Sunil and he took us to the Taj Mahal. You couldn't go to India without seeing the Taj Mahal!
The builder of the Taj Mahal, Shah Jahan, had built the Taj Mahal in honor of his wife after she died. He loved her best and wanted to do something to honor her existence.
As we arrived at the Taj Mahal, we were met with many homeless children who asked for food and money. There were a lot of children who were trying to sell us things like postcards and souvenirs.
After my encounter with Esther in Kenya, I couldn't help but buy something from this little girl. After I bought something from her, I immediately went back to my group and didn't want to attract any more attention from the many children who were selling souvenirs.
What really confused us the most was why all the natives here in India wanted pictures with us. Sunil then answered that seeing white people in India was rare. If an Indian took a picture with a white person, that Indian would kind of be famous with his/her friends.
After our eventful trip to the Taj Mahal, Sunil had taken us to the Baha'i House of Worship.
We entered into the temple without our shoes. We had made sure to buy floor-length skirts when we were shopping around the streets of Delhi. We wore those skirts with shawls that covered our shoulders. We wanted to respect the culture as much as any other Indian could.
After a long time of meditating to ourselves, Amanda, Jen, Sunil, and I all quietly left the temple.
After that, Sunil had taken us to a street filled with street vendors. After many failed attempts of trying to brush off vendors, we finally got the correct way of brushing them off.
All we needed to say that we had to ask our husbands if we could buy whatever the vendors were selling and the vendors lightly backed off. It was amazing how one sentence could make a vendor back off so easily.
The culture of India was so different. When Indians were nodding their heads, they meant no. When they shook their heads, they meant yes. It was the complete opposite of what we were taught!
Also, girls couldn't sit next to guys. That was considered too intimate for an unmarried woman.
Our first few days in India already proved to be amazing.
The reason why I wanted to come to India wasn't only for sight-seeing though. It was for a spiritual journey.
Indian Pop
Northern India
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