Early Days in Chennai (south India)

I open the curtains in my hotel room here in Chennai (formerly Madras).  The apartment building next door is a bright lime green, shaded by tall coconut trees.  On the outdoor stairs two older women in saris are chatting, while nearby a younger woman stands and joins in.  The late afternoon sun lights up her deep yellow sari, and she glows.  It is a peaceful sight, yet set in the constant background roar of traffic and honking and city noises in this town of eight million people.  

I am, once again, traveling with students to a place I've never been before: India, for the month of January, with one of St. Olaf's study abroad programs.  It is strange to be here with 20 students without Barbara, as leading such programs together has been one of our more significant experiences over the years.  And I'm playing her role, helping to manage the finances and other such tasks, as well as helping in other ways.  I'm assisting Dana Gross, a psychology prof and friend (and long-time carpool rider) with her course here on human development issues in India (family, gender, children, poverty, caste, economic development).  But it's good to be here, as India's been a place I've long wanted to visit, and I continue to enjoy time with students in this kind of setting, learning and experiencing along with them.  In the photo below, Dana and I are on the lower right, and Prince and Miriam, local social work professors at Madras Christian College who have been generous hosts to our group, are on the lower left.

We are getting used to being here.  We left on a Sunday morning (Minnesota time), and arrived in the middle of the night on Tuesday morning (India time), a long journey--to a local temperature over 100 degrees warmer than the one we'd left behind.  We're almost adjusted to jet lag, and find our hotel is both modest and comfortable, often with some warm water, and always with some good food.  Students are enjoying idlis, round white rice cakes with coconut chutney, dal (lentils in a wide variety of preparations), fresh juices, coffee with milk and sugar, a spicy rice dish, and a few other things that rotate each day.  (Southern India is more rice and lentils based, often vegetarian, while northern India is more wheat based, and more meat-eating.)  

We are almost used to the traffic.  It's always busy, a little scary for first-timers; busses, trucks, auto-rickshaws (motorized three-wheelers for a few passengers), two-wheelers (motorbikes), and occasional bicycles compete with each other for space, avoiding what looks like an inevitable collision at the last moment, on streets in which lanes are optional and pedestrians are often on their (our!) own in getting across a street (while also avoiding the occasional cows that do indeed wander the city streets).  Travel times on the bus are sometimes an hour or two.  But we do get a chance to see more of the city, which is often a dizzying mix between very modern business and apartment buildings and some fancy malls, and shacks and shanty communities, or people who are simply homeless and on the street.  

The faculty and students at our host college, MCC, have been very good to us.  Students went with our folks to some local shops to get inexpensive "kurtas" (long pullover shifts that go down to mid-thigh or one's knees, something in between a dress and a shirt), and so our students are each day looking a bit more local (at least superficially).   The picture below shows a lunch with both groups of students in the courtyard by our classroom.

I will post again soon.  This is a sampling for the moment; you can decide whether future postings might be of interest to keep up with!