Twas our last day in Chirawa, and all through the town, not a creeper was stirring, not a punch to be found. It must be the 120 degree weather that makes me fondly remember my childhood Christmases, or the fact that we are finally done marketing in Chirawa, which is the greatest gift anyone has ever given me. While we successfully collected over 2000 names, there is a nagging child grabbing at my frontal lobe and whining "Was it worth it?" Chirawa was incredibly overwhelming, in a way that Bagar or Jhunjhunu or any of the other towns I have visited haven't been. It was the kind of place where a dark cloud of "uh-oh" feeling cast an ominous shadow that radiated from every moustached man, the same atmosphere one would find at any discotheque in Philadelphia. Our final day on Thursday was significantly less bloody than Wednesday, which is always a positive, but it was still tinged with delightful hand grabbing and sexual comments that make the day complete.
The morning started off tame (this has become quite the pattern), as six of us headed off to the American English Learning Institute. It teaches over 200 students, is indoors and away from the Chirawan crowds, and nicely decorated with posters I recognized from my middle school years. "If you think you will fail you will" a cartoon chided, amongst other uplifting messages. Meg and Siler had come to speak to the director the day before, and in exchange for access to 1600 names and mobile numbers of recent college graduates, the three of us would talk to their morning classes and teach them a bit about American culture. I feel like Mobile Naukri has come to run on a scratch my back, I'll scratch your's policy that feels a liiiitttleeee bit like an escort service, but the gains are more important than the means here, so let's plow on.
After a brief pit stop in the director's office, we were escorted into the main classroom, where we were promptly told to sit on stools on a raised platform at the front of the class. 50 students stood up as we entered and sat down when we sat down- polite, right? We spoke to two classes that morning, but the first group was decidedly more interesting and spoke better English, so funnier things happened with them. We weren't there so much to field questions as we were for them to just spit out rapid-fire questions, which the director would try and answer himself. When we did get the chance to answer questions, there was a lot of confusion and misunderstanding with things that were lost in translation. After we introduced ourselves, a girl raised her hand and asked an easy to answer while being culturally sensitive question. "Do you believe in God?" she said. We paused, maybe she was joking. She wasn't, so we all looked at each other, agnostic desperation seeping from our eyes. What was the best way to answer this one? "Yes," Meg answered with an assertive nod of the head, "We love God." This seemed to please the young student, and left the door wide open for students to ask other impersonal questions. In whole the conversation went a little something like this:
Students: Do you have any siblings?
Me: No, only a cat.
Director (joking?): Yes, she has a cat and she beats her cat!
Students: Do you beat your cat?
Me: Um...no.
Students: Where is your cat right now? Is it getting beaten?
Me (speaking very, very slowly): No. we. Do. Not. Beat. Our. Cat. Beating. Animals. Is. Wrong.
Students: Which one of your parents do you like better?
All of us: Both? How can you choose?
Male Student: I like my mother better.
Director (again, jokes?): That is because his father beats him! Ha! Haha! His papa beats him so he likes his mummy better. He gets beaten by his father everyday.
Student: No, no!
Us: [Silent]. Any more questions?
Students: Do you know Venus and Serena Williams?
Us: Yes, Venus is quite lovely, sometimes we go shopping together. Serena can kind of be a beyotch though, you know? Like the fame has gone to her head.
Students: Why does the US like Pakistan?
[Much bickering between students, then...]
Students: Why is Osama Bin Laden doing the things that he is doing?
Siler deftly answered this question about Osama Bin Laden's psyche, and it was actually awesome to see the conversation turn to such a complicated subject. The students seemed to understand what we were saying, and were very engaged in the conversation. For the most part though, they were interested in what we thought about India. Meg said she like cricket, which made the students leap to their feet in boistorous applause. We were applauded several times actually, for the funniest of reasons. Siler pointed out that he had a moustache, just like Bollywood hearthrob Sharu Khan and palms were viciously slapped together. I recited the one sassy phrase I know in Marwari, the local language, and loud shouts of approval reverberated through the room. They liked us, they really liked us! They wanted us to sing, they wanted us to dance, they wanted to take pictures with us. Really though, the students took nearly 100 pictures with us, including a dozen where we shook hands with them, much like those awkward presidential photographs between Obama and Sarkozy. One side is like "Ohmygod!Ohmygod!" and the other person is like "Whaaaaat are you going to do with this picture later, Nick?" And what were these students going to do with these pictures? Frame them? Glue them to their notebook, or their bedroom wall? Or perhaps print them out wallet size and tote them around in their purse or back pocket? I think I take for granted how diverse the United States is, even in smaller towns. We are used to seeing people of different ethnicities and nationalities; I would never ask to take a picture with, say, someone from Bhutan. It was kind of cool though, sort of like being one of those celebrities famous for doing nothing. In a way, Meg, Siler and I are the Paris and Nicky Hilton of Chirawa!
The afternoon was decidedly less fun. More weird men came to hang around the table, including one guy who grabbed my hand when I handed him a business card. It's odd, because I wouldn't be the least bit upset of offended if someone in the US grabbed my hand, but here, you can smell that it's for different reasons. What reasons, I'm not entirely sure- maybe he thought that a soft finger brushing would result in something...? Anyway, Meg and I basically had to sit behind the table for the entire afternoon, flanked by the batillion unit of Pankaj, Deepak and Siler. The next couple of days are going to be spent in the office, doing (blech) data entry, but sometimes it's important for things to simmer down, you know? Next week we are going to do some marketing in Pilani, which Sahil has assured us is decidedly less creepy than Chirawa.
Oh, and good luck to the US for their match against Ghana tonight! It will be playing at midnight here in India, but we have big plans to find a TV and root for our boys.
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