Most of what we did in Ahmedabad and Baroda was meet people and chat. When you go on trips to places where you, or especially your traveling accompaniment has unyankable roots to, meeting family members (ie grandparents, aunts, uncles (from both sides), cousins, parents’ cousins, their children, others you can’t quite draw the connection to is unavoidable (not that I try to avoid it or anything). At the same time, when the same traveling accompaniment I spoke about above lived in this foreign country till his late twenties and goes back quite un-rarely, there are a whole another layer of people to meet who are just as important and often more entertaining as blood. I’d like to share short snipets with you all. Chatting for a few hours with such people with such diverse interests and work creates a boundless amount of joy and cultural wisdom. A lot of laughing, a lot of pondering, a lot of explaining, a lot of asking. And even more listening.
We went from friend to friend for two days in Abad so incessantly, that I didn’t have time to do any shopping! (Except for barely few minutes each at Crosswords, Bandej, Law Garden, and glasses buying, what I term necessity excursions). Luckily when my mother was here she covered the shopping task thorough enough for the both of us ;)
With some special people, you can meet after three, four, even ten years and it is so easy to pick up where you left off! No re-introductions, no awkwardness, no small talk. Just jumping in as if you met yesterday.
First in A’bad we met our friend Prasad, who told me about the work he has been involved with throughout his life.
The Behavioral Science Center was a network strong on social justice for minorities like Dalits/ Other Backward Caste members. In the kheda district near GJ’s coastline, the BSC saw that there were powerful caste tensions in the farming community –the landholders were upper caste Hindus who would exploit the Dalit workers, a system that had been in place for generations. So, they helped form a Dalit cooperative, creating an empowerment process where Dalits could share capital and finances, and build strong social awareness through confidence cementing. The wasteland area is adversely affected by salinity, so managing farming land for Dalits in this area is an extremely important life’s work. This entire arrangement disturbed the rich upper caste community deeply, and the Golana massacre of Dalit activists in the 80s powerfully demonstrated the sensitivity of the issue. Young Prasad got his experience working with these collectives.
Prasad was the director of the Behavioral Science Center when my dad met him. He stayed on as director through the communal riots, an extremely tough period for protecting minorities like Muslims. During his tenure he set up an electoral watch as a monitoring agency so Dalits could participate as voters without falling victim to atrocities and exclusions. He also created a disasters relief network to get Dalits through tsunamis, flood, droughts, after the devastating earthquake of 2001, in which Dalits got shafted in terms of relief and rehabilitation. Now he is working with the National Campaign on Dalit Human Rights. If you are interested in this, please check out its website at: http://www.ncdhr.org.in/ncdhr2/aboutncdhr
After, his two sons who are incredible musicians and should 100% form a band (I’d be their first fan), put on a show for us. The older son strummed his guitar and the younger one sang Greenday’s Time of Your Life. No exaggeration, they were amazing!
My dad’s friend Jimmy spent two years in Afghanistan (Woah) as a university professor and recently returned to St. Xaviers College in Abad to teach in the Behavioral Sciences Center (same as above). He was also at the Indian social Inst in Delhi in between. I have some theses he has written on women’s equality in India and Afghanistan. Jesuits have a powerful ability to go and work in places completely foreign to them! They embody these messages by working relentlessly with social issues and the disempowered.
Another family friend has known my uncle and by extension my parents ever since their college days. He works in film and reads extensively – we plunged into a philosophical discussion I cannot reproduce here for my life. This family is a family of artists and thinkers. His wife just finished her PHd on Buddhism and his daughter is a renowned classical singer who teaches adults in Varanasi! She is only 25.
We also met the most active and alert nanogenarian in the entire world, no, in all of history. At 96, though ailments have just begun restricting activity, he still writes for publication every day and participates in rallies against land displacement by the Gujarat government. He took me by the hand and explained to me how the malik (owner) of the government, which is elected on a regular five-year cycle, is the samaj (society). The samaj has the right to control the sarkar (gov’t). Natural resources were not created by anybody; they are part of the commons. As a result, they cannot be divided and plundered by the sarkar, who we know is elected by the people. So if the majority of the people in GJ are not factory owners or car drivers (GM is constructing a massive plant in GJ soon), then shouldn’t the government listen to what they say? Samaj is sanathan (unending).
Sounds simple, but it is the very basic understanding everyone needs to engrain in their heads. As recently as 4 years ago, this man would walk km upon km in demonstrations against Nirma cement plant in Mahuva, which, if built, would destroy local peoples’ farmlands. This is done without consent or consultation with the people and with grossly inadequate compensation offerings. An article with a brilliant image of him walking in this rally in 2007 hangs on my wall.
Another friend came from maldharis, or a pastoralist community that herds cows, sheeps, or camels. They spend their days with huge flocks of animals always on the move, searching for grazing land. Grazing land is becoming scarcer and farther and farther un-contiguous, so most pastoralists are constantly on the move. From such humble beginnings, our friend worked to create a large organization, which interfaces with international aid agencies and the UN umbrella. When we visited him, he just got back from a UN conference in Rome, after a short break at home from traveling to Sweden for an indigenous peoples’ conference.
He, his wife, his son, and his colleagues who work with the organization took us to this retreat center they are building in a village less than two hours north of Abad. It is like a village resort, a campus that can hold hundreds of foreign people but has the local touch of small huts with thatched roofs as “hotel” rooms. It is still work-in-progress but pastoralists from all continents gathered there for a great meeting last year. He is truly the definition of a social entrepreneur.
At night we listened to some sing beautiful folksy movement songs under the studded night. We laughed as a local maldhari told us about his travails through Airport Security in Sweden. As we all know, the airport scanner guards tell us to take off all metal watches, belts, and bracelets before stepping through the boxy detectors. This man is dressed in his traditional attire, and they insist he take off his metal bracelet, something that they beginning wearing as a child, without ever taking it off! Even ghee couldn’t get that thing off! They adamantly refuse to let him pass without him taking it off, and his toothless smile is infectious as we laugh the preposterousness of the situation. It has become a part of his body.
Pictures of the Retreat Place
At night we listened to some sing beautiful folksy movement songs under the studded night. We laughed as a local maldhari told us about his travails through Airport Security in Sweden. As we all know, the airport scanner guards tell us to take off all metal watches, belts, and bracelets before stepping through the boxy detectors. This man is dressed in his traditional attire, and they insist he take off his metal bracelet, something that they beginning wearing as a child, without ever taking it off! Even ghee couldn’t get that thing off! They adamantly refuse to let him pass without him taking it off, and his toothless smile is infectious as we laugh the preposterousness of the situation. It has become a part of his body.
Another maldhari traveling to Rome is requested to take off his belt. Now he is not wearing pants but a dhoti, a piece of cloth wrapped around in a pant like fashion held up by a belt. He tries to describe that without the belt he would moon the entire airport, all through charades and grunts. It doesn’t work, and he waits to pass through the detector with both hands holding up the cloth. Ahhh, how culture seems to get lost in translation.
