Ok so it wasn't a lost weekend but where did it go? In fact the last 4 weeks just went. In training they tell you the last month of a VSO placement will be gentle. Tidying up loose ends, saying goodbye, eating cake. That sort of thing. Not here.
I was busy trying to squeeze in training for the Delhi Half Marathon (I haven't yet got sick of dropping that into conversations). I had a visitor over from the UK then I remembered the strategy plan for ASLI. There was the flat to finish up and furniture had to be sold and belongings packed. An unbelievable amount of stuff vomited itself out of my wardrobe and the flimsy cane bookshelves yielded a bumper crop of jewellery and brass Hindi mini-Gods. I started the clearance. There was four or so bin bags for VSO volunteers to rifle through. This is a benefit of someone leaving - you get hand-me-downs for your usually sparsely equipped cupboards. Judging by the amount I was getting rid of I must have done well over the last year. The remaining went to the cleaner and there was an inordinate amount of stuff to be posted and couriered back. Frightful. I clearly can not travel light.
After the house sale I had my leaving party. We made a profit from the goods we bought last year so that provided the beer for what was to be the last party in the house. Arun of ASLI/Deafway fame (i.e. the wonderful man I have had the pleasure to work with over the last year) provided the food and manned the barbeque in exchange for being fed with Kingfisher. The Deaf Way staff created amazing canapes and took over food preparations. I concentrated hard on drinking and saying my goodbyes. I had an amazing time and it was a wonderful send off after an unbelievable year.
It was back in the office on Monday after partying, moving out and dealing with a hangover of proportions not seen yet this year. I managed to finish some final bits and we had the obligatory pizza (Puneet, the IT and English teacher, was leaving too). After lunch I said my goodbyes and there it was. I blubbed. Totally unexpectedly. Anyone who has kept up to date on this blog will know how much I have enjoyed being here. And that is a gross understatement. I've lived, worked and breathed Delhi. Anyone who knows how dusty it is here can imagine the hardships I may have had to endure.
'Will you be back?' is the question du jour. I hope I have given some idea of how much the Deaf community is still being discriminated against here. Interpreting services are just one part. Education where sign language is virtually banned, not being allowed to drive, a total lack of equality when it comes to employment, no mental health services, a lack of academic sign language and interpreting qualifications...it goes on. I'll be offering any assistance I can from the ether. And I have some plans afoot but I'm not done in India just yet. It's all about the R&R and taking some time out to consider my next steps. It's the beach for me for now.
Showing posts with label Assocaition of Sign Language Interpreters. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Assocaition of Sign Language Interpreters. Show all posts
Saturday, 4 December 2010
Monday, 4 October 2010
All Aboard...
I was 5 hours into a train journey last week when I managed to get my battery starved laptop on, cranked up the internet and tweeted: …another 37 hours to go. 42 scheduled hours from Delhi to Coimbatore in Tamil Nadu. A cool 2611 km away. That’s nearly two and half times the entire length of my home country, Great Britain.
These long train journeys in India are renowned for running late. As I stood on the platform at New Delhi relishing the freedom of the outdoors several announcements came across the loud speakers: We are sorry to announce the Shatabdi Express is running late by 10 hours and 37 minutes. We regret any inconvenience caused. We are sorry to announce the Puri Express is running late by 8 hours and 23 minutes. We regret any inconvenience caused. The train name usually becomes a bit of a misnomer.
I was lucky though. I left on the morning of the 28th at 11:30 and was due to arrive almost two days later at 05:10 on the 30th. I actually arrived a little after 6am but what’s another hour between friends.
Several snacks, some chatting with my fellow travelers, one of whom was traveling to Kerala and would be on the train for 52 hours, waving at small children who were looking up to my upper berth, a lot of reading and sleeping and it was all over. If you want to see the inside of an Indian train I took a video last year on the Puri Express and it’s up on YouTube. That journey was a monster 34 hours so nothing really.
The most amazing thing about train travel in India is you might lose a couple of days in comparison to the 4 hour flight but the damage to your pocket for over 2500km of travel in 2AC, i.e. air conditioned carriages with only two berths per space (upper and lower) is the equivalent of ₤30. Bargain.
Wednesday, 31 March 2010
Get your coat love, you’ve been pulled! – The Indian Traffic Cops
I was working at the weekend. Shocked at getting up at 4am on a Sunday, I got the train to Agra for a Deaf event. My colleague and I were doing a presentation on interpreter training and some filming. He had been there a few days so I got the train there and he gave me a lift back. We were waved off after a productive day and we settled in for the 4 hour drive back.
Not even out of Agra, my colleague answers a phone call on his mobile. Two minutes later, we’re pulled by the police. Now I’ve heard a lot of stories from people about the police and corruption, especially in Delhi.
One friend told me he got pulled for no reason late one night and he knew the police were going to make something up and charge him. He hid his cash under a floor mat apart from 200 rupees. They duly came over with a charge of speeding and told him he could pay the fine of 1000 rupees. He said he had nothing on him and offered up his 200 rupees which they took and went on their way.
Another work colleague told me a story of her husband. He is Deaf. He was pulled one night and as Deaf people are not allowed a licence, but drive anyway, he was a bit stuck. With no one to communicate between him and the police, it was a bit tricky. He ended up paying a 400 rupee bribe.
The stories of the traffic police and their bribery are endless but as another work colleague tells me their pay is so bad it is how they top up their wages. Actually, people queue to get government jobs. They are coveted positions as they provide the security of a job for life with pension benefits. So much so that recently one young man was sadly killed in a stampede at recruitment centre.
So back to Agra, my colleague pulls into the slip road and follows the policeman to this little hut. The car is in the middle of the road and autos are beeping, weaving their way round, going up on the pavement and down onto the road again. Other cars mounted the other kerb and got round somehow. I sat in the passenger seat wondering whether my presence was a help or a hindrance. Watching the cops was interesting. I could sense they like being able to wield their power but are open to negotiation. Possibly as they know they are in the wrong but it’s just what they do.
I saw my colleague negotiating, gesturing at the car. The policeman was fingering his licence deep in thought. Meanwhile, one of the Deaf guys at the meeting came out of nowhere, jumped in and moved the car to one side. He leapt out again and was signing to the police who was waving at him to go away.
Ten minutes later and my colleague jumps back in. He’d had to pay 1000 rupees but he had negotiated down from actually having his licence taken away and having to appear in court. He’d told the police he was staff at an NGO, I was a teacher visiting and they were embarrassing him in front of me. Apparently it was good I was there. It was even better when our Deaf colleague turned up just on time to back his story up.
We started talking about the corruption and how it is so inherent. To prove this he took out a slip of note paper out of his pocket that the cop had given him. It had the date, the place and was signed by the cop. My colleague explained the paper was in case he was stopped again. He could show it to the next cop just so he wouldn’t be bribed again.
Friday, 19 February 2010
Would the real ASLI please stand up?
Seven weeks into my placement and we had a conference for the Indian ASLI. Coincidentally ‘asli’ in Hindi means ‘real’. Only a week or so after I started work this was decided. What a shocker. VSO tells you to take it easy for the first few weeks to get to know people, learn more language, form those all important relationships we are told are critical for sustainable development. I’ll be honest. My first reaction was great! Then I descended quickly into thoughts such as ‘I’m an interpreter not a conference organiser’, ‘How can I do this when I don’t speak Hindi’, ‘Two staff members have just left, we have no capacity’, ‘We have no moolah’, blah blah blah. Often, I battled with some such negativity which had to be turned into a challenge, something positive. When you are volunteering and working in a different environment in a different way the old ways in which you used to work no longer apply. It just felt like too huge a challenge to take on so soon but you somehow have to find ways to remind yourself that it will be ok.
The support I had from other VSO volunteers here in Delhi was fantastic. One of whom is going soon and I will miss her very much. Her insight and perspective after a whopping three placements was invaluable. She would make me repeat VSO mantras over coffee outings: ‘I am here to advise’, ‘Relationships with colleagues are important – doing admin tasks are not’.
After a few hiccups and a massively steep learning curve, preparations started to go very well. We got some great speakers. We suddenly managed to get some funding and with one phone call out of the blue, we had the money. One courier lost most of our letters, our emails bounced back. Somehow some of our publicity worked. People came from all over the country from as far as Hyderabad, Chandigarh, Ludhiana and Bhopal.
Even the hiccups were dealt with efficiently and without fuss. One speaker had an emergency and could not attend so we got his presentation on DVD and played that instead. It seemed whatever happened we just handled it. I learnt a lot about my colleagues at that time and formed a deep respect for them. I like to think that the conference planning actually helped to form those important relationships.
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