Hard at work. - January 10, 2011

 

Until next time, peace and love. <3

Happy New Year! - January 2, 2011

Happy New Year Everyone!!!

This past week of co-op was kind of slow.  A lot of the employees on my floor took this past week off so my office was very empty. Although it was empty I still had a lot of work to do.  Work that I can honestly say, I love doing. <3

The first day at work I went to an intense protest. Myself, along with 300 others, were protesting against the unlawful imprisonment of Dr. Binayak Sen (who was recently given a life sentence for charges of sedition). There was no evidence against him: he was a doctor for the poor. From attending the protest I not only made the local news, but my picture was also featured in the "India Times" Sunday newspaper. Kinda cool.

I was in the newspaper!

A larger version of the newspaper article.

From going to this protest I realized how blessed I am to live in America.  We, as Americans, take simple things for granted: like freedom of speech. I know we all have our opinions on whether American’s really have a “freedom of speech”, and that’s neither here nor there: I’m just making the point that Dr. Binayak Sen gets life in prison for apparently saying what’s on his mind, for expressing his own opinions, and it’s unfair. I could go on about this forever, I just would ask that if you live in a society where there is freedom of speech and expression; where you're not afraid  of  getting life in prison for speaking what’s on your mind, just be greatcoat.

On a much lighter note, this week I went to an Indian wedding! An Indian wedding usually lasts between 3-7 days.  This wedding lasted 6 days. I unfortunately was only able to attend 4 out of the 6 events. My landlady invited me to the wedding because her nephew was getting married.  Although the bride is from America, the wedding was a “typical Indian wedding” (as my landlady would say). 

Headed to one of the pre-wedding dinners.

The first 3 days  of the wedding celebration were dinners.  The first dinner I attended was at the grooms' mother's house.  There were a ton of people there from both families. After the dinner everyone danced a lot! One of  my new favorite genres of music is Bollywood music! Good times.  The 4^th day there was an outdoor cocktail.  The 5^th day there was a henna party and another dinner. And finally the 6^th day was the wedding! I had  A LOT of fun at the wedding, but it also was very tiring. Most of the events happened at night so after I got off of work I would go home, change, and go straight to the event. Busy, busy, busy.

The actual wedding day was the most fun.  First, the groom’s family went over the groom’s mother’s house. After some religious ceremonies, everyone went outside to the huge white horse, and the band that was awaiting the groom. This was the start of the parade! We walked from the groom’s house to a temple, just dancing and singing the whole time.  After the ceremony, we traveled to the reception.  There was no dancing at the reception, but the food was GREAT!

My landlady's grand-niece/ my new little friend.

At the grooms' mother's house for the pre-wedding celebration. - My landlady's niece- Her Sari's were beautiful!

The groom on his white horse.

The bride and groom during the wedding ceremony.

My landlady and I at the reception.

She kept bring me flowers the whole night. She was so sweet.

Some of the brides' friends, which became my new friends. :)

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

Now let's talk about New Years.  Usually for New Years Eve I go to church with my family, and then we go out to eat at the International House of Pancakes (IHOP).  Last year I went downtown with my friend Natalie and we saw the peach drop.  [If you are not from Georgia: in downtown Atlanta every year there is a giant peach that drops in the middle of downtown to signify the start of a New Year.  There are always a ton of people in downtown Atlanta, and it's a huge celebration.]

A night walk for homelessness.

New Years this year was a lot different than how I would spend it back home.  First, I went with other employees of HRLN to a "Walk for Homelessness".   The purpose of this night walk was to reclaim the city spaces for homeless people.  The organization that put the walk on refers to homeless people as “city-makers”.  The reasoning behind this term is that the homeless of India are primarily the people responsible for building and a maintaining (in a sense) the city: they are construction workers, rickshaw drivers, etc.  Sad to say, but the government is allowing the city-makers to be swept out of the spaces that they occupy (Whether it be a side walk, the street, or a slum).  The authorities kick the city-makers off the street, but don’t provide shelters for them to go to.  The walk was to raise awareness that the city-makers should be treated better: they are the ones building the city.  At the very least, shelters should be provided for them. 

A picture at one of the few homeless shelters in Delhi.

A picture at one of the few homeless shelters.

The walk started at 8pm and was approximately 8 kilometers long (which is approximately 5 miles).  There were about 80-100 people that attended the walk.  Sad to say, even though it was a peaceful walk, police officers tried to break up the walk 3 different times (on the third time they were successful).  Although the walk was broken up at the 8^th kilometer, I do think that we were successful in raising awareness that city-makers have rights just like every other Indian citizen.

Mark, Andi and I before the walk.

Walking on the streets of Delhi.

The police trying to break up the walk.

After the walk, Mark, Andi and I met up with Anant and one of his friends at a coffee shop to count down for New Years. I was shocked at the amount of new year decorations that were around the city. Because of the fact that there were really no Christmas decorations anywhere around the city during Christmas time, I just assumed that no one would decorate for New Years either: boy was I wrong! 

The decorations in the city!

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

Andi, Mark, Anant, Anant's friend and I at the coffee shop for New Years!

 

 Until next time, peace and love. <3

Traveling around the beautiful country of India!

Hello Readers and Merry Belated Christmas!

This was my first Christmas away from home and I really missed my family. :(  Every year all my family gathers over my Grandma's house for brunch on Christmas Day.  Tons of love, presents and good ole Jamaican food! YUM! But, I missed all that, so for Christmas I decided to do a bit of traveling.  Rukku and I traveled from Thursday morning to Saturday night. We traveled to Agra and Jaipur.  

Some of the lawyers and I at the Christmas party.

Before I get into our amazing weekend trip, I must say that my past week of work went very well.  I finished a memo for Suki regarding Internally Displaced Person's and further I finished my outline for a workshop that we are going to have for adolescent girls in Indian regarding their reproductive rights. On Wednesday, Jan (a lawyer here at HRLN from England) thought of the idea to throw an office Christmas party. Nadia and I decorated the basement of the office and we proceeded to have a Christmas Party! (which really only consisted of make-shift decorations, Christmas music playing out of my laptop, cookies, and a cake).  Mostly every person in the office are either Muslim or Hindu, and traditionally, the Muslim and Hindu cultures don't celebrate Christmas, BUT everyone came nonetheless! :)

Nadia and I with our decorations lol.

 OKAY. Are your ready for the tour of Agra and Jaipur?!?!?! HERE WE GO! Wait, first, a quick geography lesson before we continue. India is separated into 28 states.  Agra is located in the state of Uttar Pradesh and Jaipur is located in the state of Rajasthan.  I live in Delhi (New Delhi), which is like a Union Territory: it's the capital of India . . . Now back to the trip --> Rukku and I took the earliest train to Agra.  I woke up around 4am in the morning to pack and catch a cab to the train station.  I was extremely tired, but also very excited to visit Agra.  The plan was, to spend Thursday in Agra, then to visit the sites in Jaipur on Friday. 

Rukku and I 6 am in the morning on our way to Agra.

We arrived in Agra around 8:30 am and stopped at the Taj Mahal first.  The story of the Taj Mahal is absolutely lovely.   It is said that King Shah Jahan fell deeply in love with his favorite wife (he had a bunch of wives).  He loved her so because she was generous, intelligent, and she gave birth to14 children.  The legend goes that on her deathbed she asked the King to  build a monument so big that the world will never forget their love.  He honored her request and later built her tomb: the Taj Mahal. It took 20,000 laborers and 17 years to complete the tomb of white marble.  It was a beautiful sight to see.

Traveling to the Taj Mahal . . .

Almost there.  . . . anticipation builds. . .

We are here! WHAT A LOVELY SIGHT!

We had to wear shoe covers prior to entering the tomb.

The detail around the building is extraordinary.

No matter where I go God's light will always shine through me :).

Sitting back and enjoying the beauty of the Taj around me.

After our visit to the Taj Mahal our next stop was Agra Fort. The architecture in this fort was also amazing.  Here are some pictures:

Agra Fort

 After visiting Agra, and on our way to Jaipur, we stopped for food. I had rice, curry cheese (can't remember the name of it), chapaties (spelling), greens, and curried cauliflower and potato.  YUM!

Also on our way to Jaipur we stopped at Fatehpur Sikri, which served as the capitol of a village named Chisti (I h.  Not sure the full story behind it, but it is a very historic site. When we arrived at Fatehpur Sikri a young man asked if we wanted a tour guide.  After repeatedly telling him no, he then followed us to the bus and proceeded to tell us the history of Fatehpur Sikri.  After realizing we would be stuck with him for the rest of our time at Fatehpur Sikri, we made the best of it and learned a lot of history from him. (History I now can't remember. Sorry readers :/)

@ Fatehpur Sikri

Our tour guide.

At a tomb in Fatehpur Sikri looking out. I like this picture.

Yes, you had to pay to use the bathroom.

After visiting all the sites in Agra on Thursday, we finally made it to Jaipur and had an opportunity to relax.  Friday morning we woke up  really early because we wanted to get a head start on the day.  First site we visited Hawa Mahal.  We arrived there at 7:30 am so it was not open yet, but the outside of the building was still incredible to look at.  The building was build in 1799 so the women of the court could get air and watch the activity of the street below.  The building is five stories and has close to 1,000 windows.  Massive structure.

Hawal Mahal.

After taking a quick stop at Hawal Mahal we made our way to Amber Fort and Palace.  I was REALLY excited to visit this site because I knew that in order for use to actually get to the Palace we had an opportunity to ride on an elephant! Yes. A real elephant! So a quick history of the Fort and Palace.  It was built in 1592 and it took 152 years to build.  The fortress was the capital of the Kachhawah Rajputs, but when the capital moved to Jaipur during the 18th century, the fort and palace was abandoned.

Although we are smiling, the ride to the palace was actually scary.

Rukku playing the drum at Amber Palace.

Beautiful architecture.

Can you see me?!

 After Amber Fort and Palace we traveled to a floating palace.  Not sure when the palace was built or really anything about the palace, but we saw it along the road and we decided to stop. It's not a tourist attraction, rather, it's an abandoned palace in the middle of a body of water.  It was still extraordinary and very beautiful.

@ the floating palace.

 The next stop of the tour . . .CITY PALACE! I'm not really sure why City Palace gets so much hype as a tourist attraction because it really wasn't that exciting. There were a couple of museums in City Palace but that was about it. But as with the rest of the sites, the architecture was splendid!

City Palace

 After visiting City Palace we went to a very cool place called Jantar Mantar.  Jantur Mantar was built around 1726 and it is equipped with solar instruments (which were called yantras).  Jai Singh II (who supervised the process of building the site) knew about the European developments of astronomy , and wanted to create the world's finest observatory of that time in India.  We had to get a guide for this site in order for him to explain all of the objects.  Amazing site, well worth the visit!

This sun dial  at Jantar Mantar can be used to tell time depending on where the sun hits the marble! Cool huh?

 Our last and final stop in Jaipur was Choki Dhani, which I would describe as a big kids playground.  It was so much fun! The purpose of this site is to give people a feel of the Rajasthani culture.  Around the site there are traditional dancers, food, puppet shows, a ferris wheel, elephant rides, camel rides, swings, a slide etc etc etc.  This night was a lot of fun!

With 2 of the dancers at Chokhi Dhani.

Getting on the camel. Nervous!

Camels make me laugh. This was a fun ride.

Traditional Rajasthani meal. Delicious!

Well readers, that is the end of my Agra and Jaipur journey. I hope you enjoyed this post and my pictures.

Until next time, peace and love! :)