Epic Post, Part I

I think a 'Ramayana' of a post is in order. So much has happened since my last posting, I can't possibly express it all in a few paragraphs, but finding time to simply sit down and blog is difficult and internet access is spotty. Here goes, and there will be pictures (soon! I have to manually shrink the file sizes, so the whole process is extremely time consuming) to make up for what my descriptions lack...

I have now settled in with my host family, the Nahals, who live in a socioeconomically diverse residential area of Jodhpur. Coming from a country where various levels of housing are very much sectioned off, it is strange to live in a modest, middle class home, yet be sandwiched between a dirt floor home and a mini-mansion. I walk down a busy road to work each morning after going jogging on a local track (I was very happy to discover that some women do jog here, although most going walking [in full-out traditional sawar cameezes and saris, no doubt], and that, enduring copious stares because in addition to being white and blonde I am also jogging, I can jog at 6:30 in the morning before Vishnu lowers a magnifying glass so that the sun can stream through and set India on fire. I had a funny interaction the other day, actually, when I mistakenly asked 'Sportsbras kaha hai?' (Where are the sportsbras?) in an athletics store, only to remember that even alluding to breasts is considered extremely risque...the female salesclerk just sort of lowered and shook her head.)

My host family could not be more wonderful. I have a host mother (Rekha, she lets me call her 'didi,' which is a term of endearment sort of meaning 'sister'), a father (Nirmal, he lets me call him 'Bhiya,' which is a term of endearment meaning 'brother'), and two host brothers (Siddharth, 19, and Siddhanth, 14). I am consistently surprised at how well the whole family gets along, how much family time they take together. One morning I woke up to find the whole family sleeping in the same room, in the same bed, even though there is a whole other bed and couch in an adjacent room...my host mother says she prefers to sleep next to her children. She is such a sweet, simple woman, and even though it is sometimes difficult to communciate with her (I can only communicate basic concepts to her in English and Hindi, because both her English and my Hindi are by no means at the level of fluency), I feel like she still expresses a great deal of concern and affection for me...

I have become a very popular conversation piece. My host family finds my random knowledge of ancient and modern Indian cultural knowledge extremely humorous, and they like to tell stories to their friends and family members of, like, that one time Danielle bargained in Hindi at the fruit stand ('Jada hai!' (That's expensive!), and 'Kam karo!' (Bring the price down a little)), or the time she knew all about Agni, the Vedic fire god. Whenever I speak Hindi, everyone repeats exactly what I say with a little chuckle. I suppose that it seems odd to many people that an American is interested in Indian culture and is trying to speak Hindi, simply because so much of Indian youth culture attempts to mimic Western youth culture.

But the more I ask questions about various cultural nuggets (What is this spice? Are government schools much worse than private schools? Why is your neclace sacred? Is this typical for your caste? What am I eating right now?, etc, etc.), the more I continue to realize how interesting my cultural and country is. Of course, India is very exotified (this is a very relative term) in the West - we owe this to the spice trade and Christian opposition to animism/pagan traditions (many people mistakenly think that Hinduism is the direct worship of animals, which isn't true...deities such as Ganesh and Hanuman are mere avatars of God, which is described as a universal energy, close to Kabbalah's interpretation), not to mention that exotification brings tourists and, more importantly, money...

My family, to my surprise, has a very exotified view of Judaism. It's not that they view Jewish traditions and beliefs as exotic, but more so that they believe Jews to be a very small minority of the American population...it’s a very rare religion. My host father is obsessed with the fact that Jesus was Jewish, and he believed that Judaism, to a great extent, was extinguished when Jesus died. Anyway, my host father is very interested in reading Talmud…

Explaining Judaism relative to Hinduism has been fascinating, just explaining various Jewish holidays, beliefs, foods, etc. by comparing them to the Hindu tradition. I think one of the most fascinating discussions was talking about how much Christianity changed when it was translated in the King James Bible, how, before that point, the religion actually had a lot in common with Hinduism (in terms of the view of mother earth, creation, etc.).

I think that one of the things that joins Hinduism and Judaism is the ceremonial and aesthetic quality. It’s easy to describe Jewish traditions in terms of symbolic foods (my host father was very intrigued by the whole Passover sedar concept), ritual candle-lighting, blessing food and drink, marriage rituals (stepping on the glass, the chupah, etc.), and the general sacredness of speech and word. This last one is extremely important in both Vedic and Jewish traditions. The chanting of Sanskrit is, in and of itself, a sacred act, just like chanting Torah in trope is.