How Was India?

Since returning to Australia, I have struggled with how to answer the inevitable, “How was India?”, from friends and family. This experience was not a relaxing holiday nor a break to recharge the batteries. To simply answer, ‘it was a great experience’ or ‘it was definitely a learning curve’, invalidates the enormous challenges the people of India face every day. For me, India was a constant fight – between the western ideologies I have been conditioned with and the new culture I had been dropped into, between me and the suffocating heat, the crowds, the chaos, the noise, the colour, the lack of hygiene, the language barrier. A fight to understand the enormity of social problems faced by men and women in India, and to comprehend the complexities of how these problems are influenced by systems of religion, caste, patriarchy and gender. There were days I would go out and feel an overwhelming sadness settle just above my heart as everywhere I turned were people who were blind, who had polio or leprosy, or who were mere shells of human beings, scarily thin and frail searching for a meal and a whole lot of hope. There were many occasions the thought crossed my mind that surely death would be a better, more dignified option. But even death can be far from dignified in a country like India.

In spite of all this, there were days I was constantly amazed by the resilience and strength of people to go about their day, to celebrate life and express gratitude (usually to some form of God) for being alive. This experience was a big lesson in letting go of the ‘shoulds’ and trusting the process, however different it may be to working and living in an Australian context. Patience and humour and getting pizza delivered were tools in the survival kit. I learned that connection can and will happen across cultural borders, personal and professional boundaries will be blurred and take time to understand, and you can form fast friendships with strangers based on a limited knowledge of the game of cricket.

I took this photo at the end of my first month in India, of a blind woman begging outside the local train station. I then saw her almost every day for the remaining two months of my stay in Chennai. If you are a woman in India, you are born an underdog. If you survive childhood, most likely you will be married by your early to mid-twenties, if not before. You will be pressured to give birth, especially to a boy child, take on the full burden of unpaid care work for your family, and be subjected to gender-based violence and discrimination. You will feel judgement if you do, say or wear the wrong thing, if you go out after dark, or if you dare let your voice be heard. If you are unlucky enough to sustain or have a pre-existing illness or disability, you will likely be deserted by your husband or family, and be left on the street to be swept up with the day’s garbage. Every day is a fight for survival, and a fight for the right to be recognised as a human being.

So, how was India? It has shattered my heart a hundred times over, I don’t know if I will have the words to answer this question in a way that will do the experience justice. There has been many different highlights and lowlights, and points in between, however I am grateful for the opportunity I had to live and learn in India. It is not something I will soon forget.