I am on to a new essay. Woolf now. On whether or not gender is a fantasy. I think it is. Thoughts?

The cricket was great. I even understand what an 'over' is now. Ben spent the entire match explaining everything that was happening to Amanda, Saloni and I, so we now vaguely understand what is going on when the men hit the ball and it goes out the park and that is a 'Sixer' and all that what not. Most educational. The match was between Delhi Daredevils and Mumbai Indians (surely a little too obvious?) and I have to say, even with my limited cricket experience, Mumbai were easily the better team. They beat delhi resoundingly by a margin of 100 runs or so I think. What was nice though was that the crowd really didn't seem to care about which team won or lost. They cheered everyone's successes equally, winced with every mistake, went wild whoever hit a 'sixer' (check me with the lingo). What was also a pleasant change to my only other experiences of major sports events (read: rugby with everyone hating everyone else/football with everyone hating everyone else AND drunk men throwing unnamed warm yellow liquid down on you) was that every time there was a good hit or a catch or whatever, all the guys would go completely crazy, stand up on their chairs yelling and singing and break out into Punjabi dance. I swear, any opportunity for the Punjabi dance is taken here. I will miss the breaking out into dance as soon as a drum beat (internal or not) is heard regardless of where or who you are. There were whole families out together, and the atmosphere was really nice and exciting, but not at all in a threatening way. The only off-putting aspect of the whole thing was the teams of white girls at the side of the pitch in hot pants who were the 'cheer leaders'. My friend Egle (being tall and blonde) has been asked to be a cheer leader before, but she turned it down despite the money. And I can see why. These girls didn't do much cheer leading as far as I could see. They spent their time on a podium and every time someone from their team scored a good number or something they would gyrate and shake their hair for five minutes or so, at which point all the younger guys would be pressed up against the fence filming them with their phone cameras. Not entirely brilliant for the cause of women everywhere and all that. It was actually really not nice to watch. But then if these girls wanted to be used as sex objects for four hours then I guess it is their choice. Even Egle, while refusing to be a cheer leader, has agreed to be paid 3000 rs to sit in the front row of a game and be in some of the film of the match in a 'look white girls come watch our players' kind of way. I think she might just be angling to meet Shahrukh Khan though, as he owns the Kolkata Knight Riders. 

In other news, my friend Emma is here! It is most exciting, though she is leaving tonight. In fact the reason I haven't written anything here for a little while is because I have been too distracted running about with her. It has been amazing and I will be sad to see her go. I will give a fuller update on that one tomorrow I think. So until then.

I have finally completed my Wordsworth essay. Possibly not to a satisfactory standard, but it is there on the page anyways. So I am taking an Opportunity.

It was the International Men's Hostel night the other day. It all started out quite nicely. My friend David was hosting alongside this woman with brilliant hair who was apparently a radio show woman. He looked like one of these wierd paintings you get from the EIC Raj of officials 'gone native' in a red kurta and white pajama trousers and these woven leather shoes. If you had placed him on a brocade chair, given him a hookah and stuck some ships in the background you really wouldn't have been able to tell him apart from these old lunatic orientalists from days gone by. 

The cultural program they put on was a bit slow in organisation terms, but the actual acts were generally very good. There was a Sri Lankan tribal dance that we all really liked with two guys wearing loin clothes and blue paint all over their bodies. The Ethiopian guys did a dance as well, which was very fun to watch as they all shook their hips and shimmied. I have noticed that there is a great love of shimmying here. All the Indian men do it as well. Many is a time that we have been dancing and then find ourselves backed into a corner as soon as a Punjabi song comes on as all the Indian men are shimmying at us. It's like some bizarre mating ritual. If they had peacock tails they would be up and wafting. Actually, it all reminds me so much of those wee birds of paradise you see on Planet Earth with the black feather fan with the bright blue stripe. These wee things back their mates into a corner, confuse the hell out of them and then swoop. Perhaps these guys think that is evidently the way to go about things. Getting back to the show, there was also a Sufi band that played some really nice stuff. They were very good, it was a shame they came on at the very end when everyone was starving. Ben, David and our Mauritian friend Kaveesh also played a few songs on guitar and singing. David and Kaveesh sang, and they are both very good it has to be said. They played one nice relaxing reggae number from Mauritius that would be great to listen to in the summer in the evenings and some Beatles and John Mayer. It was really well done. 

Bit annoyed with Marie who has broken up with David for the umpteenth time and who decided she had to leave when David came on as it was all too difficult for her to bear obviously. We all told her not to come when she had started going on about not wanting to hear him or see him or even be in the same building as him, but she had insisted on coming just so that she could create some drama. It has now got to the point that we get either angry or bored of the Dutch people's ridiculous friendships/relationships...ah well. I am sure they will be back together in a week or so. And then the whole rigmarole can begin once more...

Unfortunately the lights all went when we were meant to get food. So everyone ended up a bit grumpy as they were hungry and in the dark. Finally got food however which perked things up and by eleven the power was back. Which meant it was time for dancing! We got in tow with our Ethiopian friend from history and the other guys who had been dancing earlier (one of whom was evidently styling himself on Bob Marley so much it hurt) and some cool Nigerian guys as well. All of them were really good dancers and we had a lot of fun careering about with them. Amanda and I ended up so sweaty it was disgusting. Not as bad as Omar though. Omar is our friend from Paisley (of all the places in all the world, he even knows where Inchinnan is!) and he sweats so much when he is dancing it is like he is on E. Either way, a good night was had by all, and the dancing went on till half one in the morning. My thighs hurt by the end of it. The 'bird of paradise' thing happened A LOT at first, but once we insinuated ourselves into the African group we were well protected. Some of these Indian men are just bonkers. 

In other news, I found a tiny spider on my bed the other day. What was far worse though was that the spider could JUMP. It could leap an inch or so under its own tiny steam. I nearly cried. I was very good though and manage to immobilise it (read: bash it to death with a large book) so that I could pick it up with tissue and chuck it in the bin. I was really proud of my near-lack of freaking out. I didn't even scream. I do however think every little itch or twitch on my skin is a spider. Continuing the bug theme, there are these giant bright acid yellow wasps everywhere and they are really huge and scary. I don't even know what happens to you if they sting you. Goddamned spring. Makes everything be alive. The mosquitoes are back as well. Sigh. Slightly nicer wildlife: there was a small falcon on my balcony the other day. It's the smallest I have seen. There were about thirty eagles swooping about inside our hostel last week too. Most exciting and slightly menacing.

Had a really interesting talk this morning on Indian foreign policy in the years after Independence. Talking about the non-aligned movement, and the personal role of Nehru in the whole thing. He basically decided India should not go into military alliances with the US or USSR block so that he could use both countries for aid and for economic and social links instead. It is quite interesting how the relationship with China deteriorated in the period and how that basically put-paid to the non-aligned movement in practice. Also quite interesting how these countries viewed the coming of the Hydrogen bomb and the atomic bomb as well as the sure path to the destruction of humanity. Ironic that for a government so convinced in earlier years of the evils of nuclear weaponry, India is now a nuclear power and quite keen to make the rest of the world, especially Pakistan, know it. All under the dubious excuse of 'self-defense'. I might try to write an essay on Indian foreign policy as the relationship with China and the USSR is really interesting, especially since the USSR's neutrality during the Indo-China war of the 1960s basically cut the USSR off from the People's Republic, acting in the interest of a capitalist democracy... 

Tonight we are going to the cricket. It is Delhi vs Mumbai. I have never been to a cricket game before now, and I hope it is worth the hassle. The cricket here is much shorter than the stuff at home. Sort of on a par with a football game. All us Europeans are going. Shall be a fun outing. I don't know the rules of cricket, but I am sure there is no problem with that. I will cheer when everyone else does. I have been interested in seeing a match actually ever since ShahRukh Khan brought it all to international attention after he denounced the IPL's decision not to elect Pakistani players into the teams for 'security reasons' and the Shiv Sena went completely bonkers as per and attacked cinemas showing the actor's latest film in Mumbai. 

Other than all this, I am so excited for Emma coming on Friday. Her father is evidently a well-respected cheese as people from his company base here in Delhi have been calling me sorting out how Emma will get to and from places and offering me services. Its all very civilised and I am tempted to abuse their offer of a car to ferry us around the city. Then again, might be more hassle than it is worth, considering how terrible traffic in Delhi is. 

Ah well. Enough for now. Wish us luck at the cricket. Dilli Jao!

Tiny Trip Up North

A bit late. But there we have it. Wordsworth is currently eating my eyes (or so it feels), and I have decided to take a well-deserved break and update.

 05/03/10

Tonight was the North Eastern students Guest Night. I have to say, it was far more organised and professional than our own Grand Shambles. But then, that wouldn't have been hard in all honesty. They followed about the same schedule as we did, with a welcome address, cultural program, dinner and dance. Their chief guest was Deepak Pental, the VC of the University, who, I am sure those of you who remember my earlier blogs will see no change in my opinion, was characteristically late and completely boring and ineffectual. He is such a drab man. Nothing in comparison to all the turbaned stature of Navjeet's father. He exudes 'imperial'. Deepak exudes something along the lines of 'a wee cup of tea'. He is small, wears drab brown clothes (the male equivalent of your granny's), has a droopy expression, a weak smile, unmemorable voice and action, shuffles, and is quite saccharine and silly. He isn't even old. I could forgive an old man. Not a middle-aged one. Sigh.

So of course, he was late, and I had to sit waiting for about two hours getting my legs gnawed to pieces by mosquitoes. I still have the scabs. Not cool. Our mess men were wanderign through the crowd keeping everyone sustained with veg croquettes and fizzy pop though and they laughed when they saw me there. Eventually everything got started though, and the night opened with the cultural dress show. I was most taken with the different Naga and Mizoram dresses. The Naga dress is a patterned woven scarf/skirt that is sort of like a kilt in size and function. It come in varying patterns, depending on the tribe to which the wearer belongs, and whether it is a particular festival, or if it is a married/unmarried woman. They have long strings of jade and ivory beads as well. The Mizoram dress has tall head dresses of flowers and pompoms and peacock feathers. One of the head dresses had two prongs sticking out the sides with long strings of green beads and this one was for more auspicious occasions. After the cultural dress show, there were various dances from the states, including a brilliant one that is done at Assamese New Year. There was a group of boys, all using their own instruments to make the music and singing the lyrics (there was one particular one, Raj, who could REALLY sing, and who I would have happily listened to all night), and then the girls came on to participate in a group dance. It was very joyful, and there was one move that did remind me sort of the funky chicken. The Naga and Mizoram dances were fun as well, lots of stomping and jumping involved. Some of the girls put together a Western Revue dance that was also really well done. They had obviously practiced for a while, as they could even all do the Beyonce Single Ladies dance. I was impressed. After the dances, the girls had got a local group in, The Skinny Boys, who were all either North Eastern or Korean (they tend to be the other cool kid group around here) and who were all girls. They were really very good, and the lead singer and the drummer were particularly good. It was a really nice way to wrap up the programme and wait for dinner. After dinner we had paan (got to love paan). I have learnt to ask for mitha paan now if I ever want sweet paan. Though I tried it with the betel nuts for the first time and I had to spit them out as I couldn't even try to chew them they are so hard. By the end of my second one my teeth were a nice red colour. Thankfully, everyone else's were too, so it wasn't a massive issue. After the dinner there was a DJ (a good DJ at that!) until half twelve and we danced like loonies for about two hours. Met a few more really nice girls, including one from Assam who does physics, and who offered me to stay in her house if I go to Assam in May. 

I left feeling incredibly happy. It was probably better than our own Guest Night. 

Also, note on the fashion of the North East girls - they know how to dress. Buggered if I know where they find these clothes, but god are they fashionable. One girl was in a black, blue and bright pink swirl pattern chiffon playsuit. A playsuit! A chiffon playsuit!!! In DELHI!!!!

All is not lost.

HOLI

Today is Holi! HAPPY HOLI!!!

A word of explanation about Holi:

Holi is a festival where people defy usual social boundaries and come together to throw water and coloured powder at one another. It is effectively a religiously sanctioned paint fight. Men drink bhang (a special lassi made with hash) and everyone eats these special sweets that are sort of like baklava and generally has a very good time. The festival is a play act of Krishna and Radha’s paint fight. Krishna supposedly asked his mother why Radha had such pale skin in comparison to his dark skin, as he was jealous of her complexion. His mother told him to go and paint radha a new colour if he was so jealous as a joke. But Krishna went and got some paint powder and covered Radha in it, causing her to retaliate, and so for the Holi play to happen. And that is why people celebrate Holi by throwing colours at each other.

 

Holi seems to be the time when the world goes mad. As soon as the girls got their hands on the colour, they went wild. Soon we were looking like those modern dancers, completely covered from head to foot in colour. It looked fantastic. And then someone managed to work out how to turn the hose on. And then people started playing in the fountains, and then the water was being poured over everyone, and so all the colours ran into one another. Some people managed to get so wet they got clean by the end of it. I was still a sort of pinky-red-purple colour by the time we were done. It was great fun. Everyone came together and just let inhibitions go, chucking colour and water and running around like loons. The pictures we have are brilliant.

The world outside was mad as well. We were actually locked in the hostel until half four in the afternoon for fear of our safety at the hands of bhang-fuelled revelers. Amanda and Shaina had wanted to go out to JNU in the morning, but they weren’t allowed onto the street. Thankfully we had more than enough fun by ourselves without going out. Lauren and Amanda went out at half four to get some juice and they said they met some men who were obviously completely high and were being verbally quite aggressive and scary. It made them realise that the hostel had a point about not letting us out. All the men who usually don’t speak to girls would have been so high from the bhang that they wouldn’t be scared of us at all. On the contrary, they would be violent and aggressive.

The other thing about Holi is that the colour makes you tired. Everyone who hasn’t had the colour on them says that the tiredness is just an after-effect of running about in the fresh air. But it isn’t the same sort of tired. It is an exhaustion that is mental as well as physical. You can’t think about anything, let alone try to do work or read. You just sleep. We slept for about five hours each and then woke up only to eat and go back to bed. I got no work done today. Not for want of trying, I just couldn’t concentrate at all. Incredibly weird feeling.

Despite the strange narcotic paint, I feel that Holi needs to become a regular feature of my life. I am going to make everyone play it on the Meadows next spring. It is just too good to not keep it up. 

28th February

Have spent the entire day today trying and failing to work in my room. The internet is killing all attempts to do anything however. Also, it is getting hot. All I can cope to have on my in my room is a cotton dress or perhaps my cotton pyjamas or salwaar. Anything that actually sits on my skin is becoming unbearable. It is still February, and yet it is already 27 degrees during the day. And it is no longer cold at night – I can happily take a rickshaw home at night in only a long sleeve top. This all bodes very ill for the coming months.

Egle and I got an auto rickshaw to the metro later in the day and she managed to fire water at a group of boys. We felt so proud. Pay back for the week we have had of running away from every man and child lest they should have a water bomb on their person. I don’t mind water really, or even the paint, but I mind anything else. My friend Sajedeh was hit by what she thought was just a water bomb but she later discovered that it was mixed with urine! A whole new level of human degradation right there. I think I would feel so violated! Uninvited bodily fluids!

In the evening we went out to the Habitat Centre for a civilized Holi celebration with dances, singing and food. There was a strange sort of dance-enactment of the Rada-Krishna Holi fight complete with dancers with huge peacock feather fans strapped to them so that they looked like they had a peacock tail. There was no paint throwing. Instead, 70 million marigolds must have sacrificed themselves for the night as people were chucking the petals around instead to simulate paint. I was there with Lauren, Ben, Elmira, Egle and her boyfriend Carlos, and another girl from France who sounded peculiarly Australian. It was sort of awkward sitting there feeling like a complete gooseberry every time Elmira disappeared and I was left with Lauren and Ben being awkward with each other. Nonetheless, it was a nice thing to go to, and I felt vaguely cultured by the end. After the showe we went to Mocha Café in Defense Colony. I had never been before, and I have to say it is really nice. It is a Moroccan atmosphere, with lots of different kinds of coffee and shisha on offer. We got a ‘Casablanca’ shisha that was apple and mint flavoured. The whole place is fairly reasonably priced as well for somewhere in Defence Colony, and it was really relaxing to be in. We spent a long time in there just sitting and smoking shisha – a pleasant alternative to our usual nights out to Urban Pind or wherever. I am not sure what it would be like in the day though, and it is definitely not a place to go if you are a bit older and not hippy-inclined.

On our way out the café I got hit smack in the side with a water bomb. Thankfully it was only water, but I did have a moment of panic remembering what Sajedeh had told us. Lauren and I just headed home – we had been told that the guards were letting no one in post-11 pm due to Holi dangers but we had realised this was just foolishness as what could they do? Let us sit out on the pavement? (And of course we were right – we were let in no problem.) Ben went off to JNU for the night as he is celebrating Holi there tomorrow. I think Shaina and Amanda are going to go to JNU tomorrow to celebrate as well. Elmira and Egle went back to Carlos’. They are going to a farmhouse in the South of the city for this big expensive Holi party. I am kind of glad we are just staying in the hostel, as it means that we will be able to get some work done hopefully once we have finished playing. 

Hostel Guest Night, or the Grand Fiasco

I agreed to help in our annual hostel gust night, being a good little hosteler and all. At first I had been approached to host the damned thing, but I had said no. Amanda had told me about her experience of the Diwali party and how they had expected a script and all sorts from her, and seeing as I have impending essay deadlines, I just didn't think it was feasible. However, my friend Tanveer then came to me saying she would host it, but would I help her by announcing a few things. I can deal with announcing things, so I said yes. What a mistake that turned out to be.

Tanveer asked me to write the welcome note, and she would write the introduction for the chief guest, Professor Upinder Singh, daughter of the Indian PM and a history lecturer at Delhi University, and everything else that needed writing. Unfortunately, Tanveer buckled under stress mid-week, leaving me to run around writing everything else. I ended up setting the program for the whole night, getting the acts organised into an order, chasing everyone up to make sure they were ready and even printing off the damned programs. I had everyone who was anyone chasing me, from the Provost to the culture committee (who should have set the program themselves seeing as they were the ones in charge of the night from the off). I managed to get everything done in the nick of time, but I felt like I was being run off my feet. Obviously there was nothing that could have been done. All the girls were like headless chickens, the Provost had been completely uninformed of how things were going till the last minute and so felt she could change things at the last minute, the President of the hostel was shirking all responsibility including the writing of her own speeches which she got other girls to do after I point blank refused and then avoided her for two days, and Tanveer was for all intents and purposes MIA. The only person to offer much helpful support was our new resident tutor, who knows Crispin (what historian here DOESN'T know Crispin??), and who was good enough to look over what I had written a couple of times. 

Trying to get the damned thing started was hard enough. None of the acts appeared assembled, Tanveer was nowhere to be seen, and despite my repeated attempts to check that the music was ready for each piece I kept on being told to give two more minutes. How and ever, the night finally kicked off. So I said my welcome note. Tanveer appeared and said her introduction and acted the entire night like nothing was wrong and that I was like a clever child who followed her directions well. Throughout the cultural show I had the Provost hissing in my ear asking me to speed things up and then to make the girls move to a particular piece of stage or sing louder or whatever else she thought was wrong. Despite my obvious powers of telepathy (...) I was unable to satisfy each and every demand and in the end got quite confused. Every time I announced an act there would be two minutes of kerfuffle while the girl who had assured me she had all the music cued and ready to go found the music. Elmira said it was hilarious when I said that "'ready' must be a euphemism for 'not ready'" to the audience by way of explanation of why I announced things that did not appear. The President Maria got really angry with me when I suggested she perhaps should hand out all the committee certificates later on due to time constraints (I had no knowledge of how long each act lasted, and nor did anyone else seem to for that matter, which was interesting when we had allotted the show one hour only) and she told me I was ruining the entire thing for her. Fortunately I was vindicated later when everyone agreed with me that it could have been skipped and that it was as boring and stupid as all hell. 

One thing I learnt while presenting this madness was that I am good at being a host, but no good at improvising acceptable anecdotes to tell in between acts. All I could think of amidst the shambles was how much like a convent the hostel was, and how many of the occupants appeared to have no common sense or concept of reality. I couldn't have dared come out with "So this one time Lauren flashed a nun..."

Some of the acts were very good. Mehrnoush did her Iranian dance - the sexiest classical dance known to man bar belly dancing (ah the irony of an Iranian woman dancing sexily in public when it is illegal in her own country), and the Bangladeshi girls' dance was very professionally done as well. Saloni's salsa and the Mauritian dances stole the show, as everyone thought they would. The African girls' dance was very good as well, and they had painted their faces in a very funky way with loads of white dots. The fashion show (or cultural dress display should I say - apparently 'fashion show' is a term degrading to women according to our Provost) was nice as well. Lauren looked great. Amanda and I had constructed a completely mad Queen Elizabeth outfit complete with ruff for her. 

I could have cried for joy once the whole thing was over. I went upstairs with Amanda and tanya, had a shot of Old Monk for the nerves (you know it is bad when you are breaking out Old Monk. Old Monk is our version of Tesco Value Gin) and went back down to eat. The food was amazing, and the dancing was great fun. I managed to forget all the silliness of the night pretty quickly. We were reminded of the fact that we live in a prison though when the party was abruptly ended at 11 pm sharp, lest we stay up past our bedtimes. It really is truly ridiculous. The guards then started herding the guys out of the hostel, prodding them in the back. 

The night was great fun and frustrating. Fun because of the company, the silliness, the dancing and the general camaraderie. I now know so many more people in the hostel by name having spent several days trying to corral them into some kind of order. It was frustrating because I had been left to do so much more than I had anticipated, had therefore done no work, had managed to piss off several people because I couldn't cater to every little whim as it rose up, everyone had to leave by 11pm and there was no drink involved. Thankfully it is the last large event in the hostel calendar so I need not worry about being preyed upon for anything like this ever again. 

I sound sort of annoyed by the whole thing. I wasn't. I was happy when afterwards people came and told me I had done well and had been a good host. I just wish they could have taken on some of the responsibility themselves. It has also taught me never to organise anything with Tanveer ever again, as she might be unable to cope and thus leave me up shit creek. 

The other interesting thing about the night was Ben's roommate Manjesh. He told me that he hardly recognised me, having not seen me since the start of our time here. Apparently I am 'Indianised'. Am I? I asked Iain and he said that I was certainly a little bit more tanned than usual, which was totally helpful. I find this slightly funny as I was wearing a halter-neck purple dress with a completely inappropriate cleavage: The Indian Look.