Wednesday, June 22, 2005

the rising

my spirit wanes when i watch children beg for money...india: the sleeping giant that rolls over and crushes the less fortunate. progress: a man on fire that burns anything standing in its path while it rushes madly for water. in the mad dash to modernize, westernize, and super-size india conveniently forgets its problems; like an alcoholic drunk on a heady brew of technology and growing wealth. like all alcoholics though it wakes to face the mirror and finds the lines under the eyes a little deeper , the same problems that lurk under the skin spreading like cancer.
to say that india has changed is an understatement. every industry in india grows at rates equalled only by china, and because of its status as a democracy (albeit one as corrupt as richard nixon) it also carries the strength and support of the u.s. that the chinese lack. more cars, more malls, more high rises are merely cosmetic differences though. as we sat in our air conditioned car, on our way back to my aunt's lush home, a young boy, clothes ragged and face weary from absorbing the blast of heat and suffocating pollution of india's streets all day, hobbled up on two crutches and one leg, knocked on the window, and extended a bone thin hand. my mother,luckily, saved her leftovers from dinner and gave both containers to the boy along with 10 rupees. his first proper meal in god knows how long happens to be scraps from somebody else's plate.
sadly, most of india's poor are children. poverty here varies vastly from poverty in the u.s. when in big cities; chicago, new york, even indianapolis, many of us confront a few beggars here and there, mostly aged men and women, or rambling alcoholics and drug addicts. here they number in the thousands, their faces are young, their bodies are small and they live on the streets. life here offers no options, as the closest thing to upward mobility is an elevator in a nearby glass-plated high rise. a quality education is a right reserved for the wealthy and india still toils in a nameless caste system that they claim to have discarded decades ago. if you are a servant's son, in all likelihood you end up a servant as well. there are no rags to riches stories here, no dickensian fables of a poor boy done good. i cannot help but keep my eyes open to the horror of the truth.
i am struck by the duality of india. the beauty of its untouched regions, of its outer layer is unmatched. the himalayas majestically providing a barrier between two growing superpowers, ancient temples and forts a testimony to its inherent spirituality and its glorious past. but when you get to the city centers, the heart of this country, you find underneath the facade of gloriously modern buildings and spiraling highways, a country allowing itself to rot from within. there are thousands of indians overseas that have made a profound mark on their adopted countries (my parent's included) but they return to their ancestrial homes as outsiders, aping concern for the state of their mother land but doing nothing about it. the wealthy within india's own borders(and there are quite a few) are content as long as their coffers continue to grow, walling themselves inside modern housing developments, complete with their own supermarkets, health clubs, golf courses, and gas stations, so that they're only foced to face the truth on their way to work and back. india cannot survive if its foundation, the people without, continue to suffer. desperation is a mighty force, and progress cannot build a wall strong enough to contain it.

Saturday, June 04, 2005

Outside in the cold distance...

monsoon season arrived without warning the other night...i've been going to bed early, and have settled into a routine which for me seemed impossible...rising at 7:30, breakfast at 8:30, lunch at 2:00, dinner at 8:30 and then bed by 10:00...yes, all of this order and punctuality from the Don of perpetual lateness...
so i finished the book i've been reading ("everything is illuminated" for those who were wondering...spectacular book..different from anything i've read before...) and i turned off the light, keeping a close eye on the wall lizard which decided to roost in the corner of my room for the evening...yes...it sounds backwards and rundown but that's not the case...you just cannot keep these little bastards out of the house, no matter how much netting you put up...there's just too many of them in this climate...
i fell asleep rather quickly, probably something to do with the full meals i've been getting recently, as opposed to the substitute for nourishment i'd been surviving on in indianapolis...
i awoke at 3 a.m. to the loudest clap of thunder i'd ever heard. i thought that the india-pakistan nuclear testing war had reached a head and i'd managed to get myself stuck close to the border at the worst possible time...the lightning that preceded the thunder caused the light next to the bedstand (which wasn't even on!!!) to blow out in a flash of brilliance....the air conditioning cut out and i could hear the wind roaring in from the east, and the rain pelting the window pane to my left...this ensued for nearly two hours without pause...lightning so bright that for a split second the entire room was illuminated and i could see my reflection in the mirror which stands directly in front of the foot of my bed...thunder that pounded my ears relentlessly...and the mixture of humidity and heat that only comes with the monsoons...as it poured torrentially outside, my brow and back sweated profusely...i tossed and turned in my bed for the rest of the night, listening to the rain and praying for it to stop so i could finally get to sleep and maybe the power would come back on..
sadly, this wasn't to be...i wandered like a zombie through the next day, only to be greeted in my sleep with another storm, this one more vicious than the last. by morning, power and phone lines were down, 4 people had died in the storm, and the sun and heat made the only reminders of the storm the over 400 trees that were felled by the onslaught...i realized that this wasn't just rain, but some higher power flexing their muscle...