Garbage Beneath Build A Healthier India What does one do at 5AM? I know that it will be hot as the day goes along; I know that the group schedule will leave little free time. I go for my walks. In Delhi, the morning after our arrival, I leave our hotel around 7 or 8 …
Category: India Memories
509. Bhakti, Religious Festivals, and Devotion
I hope to learn about Hinduism. Being an academic, I thoroughly enjoy the earlier lecture about classic textual Hinduism as expressed in the Bhagavad-Gita and the Ramayana. Because Sunithi, one of our seminar organizers wants us to learn about "lived" Hinduism, she leads several of us to Mylapore’s Shaivite “Peacock Temple” as well as the …
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508. Women’s Roles and Status
Not only the seminar's women, but also the men, want to understand Indian women’s roles and status. While we all realize that there is a complexity to this set of issues, we also could not forget ancient texts, older practices, and current exploitation. At its extreme, classical and parts of contemporary India encouraged women’s inequality, …
507. The Working Women’s Forum
Massive suffering often brings responses. Since women’s roles and status in India are often dismal, there are organizations which seek to rectify the situation as best as it can. One such organization is the Working Women’s Forum. Because of a 1977 flood in Madras (Chennai), Ms. Jaya Arunachalam formed an organization to help women of …
506. Trying to Understand Varna, Jati, and Caste
My own seminar goal is to familiarize myself with Hinduism and some of the basic features of religious life in India. I never forget that I’m new to studying Hinduism. Obviously, one of the features to understand is the historically influential varna, jati, or caste system. The very words suggest the complexity of India life. …
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505. Everybody Knows This Man: Gandhi
Everybody in the world knows Gandhi. While our seminar organizers provide a wonderful selection of speakers, one of our most appreciated speakers is Professor K. Swaminathan, the 94-year-old editor of the Collected Works of Gandhi. Upon receiving a master’s degree from Oxford and becoming a professor at Presidency College in Madras (Chennai), he became the …
504. A Taxi-Race and a Train Compartment
One of the seminar’s purpose is to familiarize us with India’s geography. No simple feat! Not only varied geographically, India, one-third the size of the USA, is a huge country! The seminar begins in the Ganges river basin in north central India, Delhi, Agra, and Jaipur. We travel south to the Deccan plateau city of …
502. First Days in Delhi: Tuk-Tuk Driver, Kurtas, Devotion at a Mosque, and a Dead Pigeon
Humayans Tomb 3 Qutb Minar We arrive in Delhi. Our first days are primarily to adjust to India. Hotel Claridge's is only a few blocks from Humayans Tomb. As a group, we visit Qutb Minar and the Red Fort. Whether sightseeing or walking on the street, street sellers, and individuals hanging around tourist sites, want …
501. Inauspicious Beginnings
Departures and Arrivals. Every trip has these components. It doesn't matter whether I'm going to the grocery store, driving to Stone Mountain to climb the mountain, or flying to India. Departures and arrivals are part of the journey. Our departure from Atlanta to New York is not smooth. Because of stormy weather, we miss our …
500. Remembering India through a Fulbright-Hays Seminar
Similar to many other recent, freshly bestowed, humanities PhDs, I didn’t have a full-time job. Fortunately, I am an adjunct at DeKalb College. Because my wife Mary teaches English at DeKalb Technical College which is right next door, we both know, and are known, by several of the local college faculty and administrators. One winter …
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