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.

The benefit of having such a big event early has meant I could meet many interpreters from all over the country that are already working, many without access to training or support. We completed a survey to ask members what they wanted. I now know far more about sign language interpreting and the Deaf community in India from this experience. This will inform our future planning and how I complete the placement over the next nine months. With the benefit of that all so important 20-20 hindsight, it was the ideal way to make a start on the job.

Indian ASLI Facebook Group:
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=280662800900

Websites:
http://www.signasli.org/ 
http://www.vso.org.uk/

The Three Month Meltdown?

A few days ago, I crossed the infamous three month mark. Infamous in VSO terms and amongst volunteers here. It’s sink or swim time. If you’re going to get it bad the likelihood is it’ll happen now. A mild depression maybe, hating the country you are in, thinking about your friends, missing family, wanting to go back home. Perhaps not washing (apparently).

There’s no upset here though. That’s right...I still shower. Yes, I miss my friends and family in a way that I didn’t before. Well if you’ve only just arrived you miss people but you haven’t been gone that long. You’re so busy taking in all this information and your new surroundings. You’re in contact with people back home regularly. Maybe it’s because it’s around now that it hits home. You won’t see people for another nine months. It’s a pretty long time to miss people. Skype and emails are good but no substitute. I'd love to share a glass of wine with friends. It’d be good to see my flesh and blood in the erm...flesh.

I’ve noticed how everything just feels easier. My placement is still a challenge. I love it though and it’s much easier now I better understand what is needed. I get along with people at work and really enjoy getting to know them. My Indian Sign Language gets better for every day that I set aside time to chat to colleagues. Even my Hindi is better. On a recent trip to Janpath market, the stall holders were congratulating me on my ‘thori thori Hindi’ (literal translation: 'little/small' Hindi). Life is a little better now I can hold my own more in a negotiation with an auto driver.

I no longer haul back Kingfisher from the supermarket. We get it delivered when we need to wind down. I still get lost now and again. Who doesn’t in Delhi? The house numbers and streets defy logic. I love yoga in my local temple. I cannot describe how amazing it is to do yoga to the sound of temple bells with Yoga guru-ji. He contorts himself into assans most of us cannot do but have a laugh trying. The laughing yoga is one of the best bits. This is no stuffy yoga class back home.

I have a social life. A mix of local friends and other volunteers makes for a great support network and all together they make up an amazing bunch of people. We’ve sourced the local nightclub. Ladies night, free drinks all night is much better than it sounds. It’s a proper club, with great people. No line dancing or bad taste decor here. As long as you keep your eye out for people slipping roofies in your drink it’s pretty safe and fun.

So in answer to two people recently who said I sounded stressed from my blog. I’m not. I may write about the stresses of life here: getting parcels delivered or arguing with auto drivers. These are just observations on life here and things that have happened. Cliche alert: Overcoming these challenges and being here is one of the most rewarding things I’ve done in my life. Yes I miss people and get stressy every now and again. I like to have a trip in the diary to know I’ve got fun planned. I like keeping up with people. I treat myself to the odd shopping trip, market visit or pedicure. Cheesy I know: I wouldn’t want to be anywhere else in the world right now.

(The Pic of the Taj is to show what a terrible life it is here!)

Queuing at the Delhi Counter

This is a tale of Indian bureaucracy and a one-woman crusade to get a parcel through customs duty-free. Our story starts a few days before with an email from DHL saying I needed to pay 5,600 rupees in duty for a parcel of personal effects that had been sent over by my parents. After sending a letter and having three different people deal with my case, I was told I had to go personally to the DHL office at the airport to show some ID and collect my parcel.

10:01 Call DHL to enquire as to whether parcel is ready or not. Informed I should get there before 11:00. I explain this will very much depend on my foreigners’ ability to get an auto-rickshaw but I will do my best.

10:32 Having been turned down by three autos, a disembarking passenger takes pity on me and translates to the driver where I want to go. After agreeing to an exorbitant amount we make our way to the DHL office at the airport.

11.37 Three wrong gates and we arrive at the correct one. I am told I need a security pass to get through the gates to the DHL office. Call all three people that have been dealing with my case and DHL reception. No-one picks up. One security guard walks over to the building 100m away with my passport. He returns and I get a pass.

11.45 Irate auto driver demands payment and I leave him, mistakenly, floundering outside whilst I enter reception thinking, foolishly, that I will flash my passport and walk away with the goods into said auto and ride on home. No one is at reception. This is not a good start.

11.56 Receptionist turns up, explains everyone is in a meeting and someone with deal with me in 10 minutes. Offered a chai (to calm the irritated white woman who clearly doesn’t understand she is in India).

12.18 Chat to fellow angry queue person. He tells me DHL used to be good here. Four years ago. Stand up ask receptionist for nth time to see the person dealing with my case.

12:37 Another member of staff arrives. I repeat 12 times in a row that I want to see Miss S. This results in me saying to anything he says, ‘Get her now....just go in the meeting and get her now’. Feel like I’m losing it.

12:43 Ask for the manager. Get told she is in the same meeting. Repeat mantra...’Get her now’. Wonder if I will bang my head on wall soon like a child having a tantrum. Enter into further cahoots with lovely Sikh business man who asks me if I now think India is a third world country.

13:10 Manager comes out. Sikh man goes for it. Wondered what happened to our camaraderie seeing as I was here first. Pout. Do the patient British thing then jump into the debate. Point out a customs delay is one thing, non-communication and shoddy service from an international company is not acceptable. Tirade earns me a handshake and business card from fellow complainer.

13:20 Manager has disappeared without saying when she is coming back. I’m left on my own fuming in reception with one member of staff and the receptionist eyeing me suspiciously. Point at service excellence award of 2006 and ask them what happened.

13:33 Get allocated a DHL fixer, N, who will accompany me to customs. Pay off angry auto driver far too much but just want rid of another problem. Arrive at customs. Everyone is on lunch for another 30 minutes.

14:16 Pay to get form processed. N takes pity on me and buys me a coffee and a bread pakora as I have not bought food for the obviously long wait ahead of me. He tells me if anyone can get my parcel duty free it’s him. We laugh at his stories, laugh at my earlier tirade and shake hands. Turn round. 50 customs staff are staring at us.

14:24 N gets a phone call from the office. Customs had told DHL my parcel had been moved from courier to cargo for collection but this was not the case as the parcel has not been physically moved. We are in for at least a two hour wait. Proceed to discuss my extent of Hindi, where to buy meat, the best nightclubs in Delhi and where to go on holiday over the next hour.

15:27 Spot the suggestion box which is suspiciously empty. N takes another call from the office.

15:40 Press a button on my mobile and discover I can activate a fake incoming call on my mobile. Envisage I can use this for getting out of bad dates in future.

15:43 N takes another call, we go to the on-site bank, pay another processing fee and head back to a different counter in the customs waiting area. Back at the seats I spot a flow chart. Work out I am on step 4 of 15. Wonder if people ever die trying in this place.

15:56 Go to get form stamped by a different official and then ushered in to see the Assistant Commissioner of Customs. Hand in my form and passport and tell him my details should now be on his computer screen. He presses a button on his keyboard and waves me away.

16:01 Get my two hour security pass, which expired two hours ago extended by four hours at a different department. N looks at me apologetically.

16:03 See first sight of parcel sitting tantalisingly on a bench. I’m told I must wait for the right official to open parcel and get contents examined. He is currently in a different building. As I am waiting see sign that reassuringly says some items are duty free for import and export. The list includes human remains, eye balls and ashes. It seems like hardly anything gets through here duty free. The official turns up, inspects contents and leaves. Two men reseal package. N disappears to do paperwork with yet another official. The two men ask me for a tip. I eye ball them in disgust and state emphatically, ‘Na-hi’. I wait for the parcel to be resealed. I watch them whisper as I go to fetch N. He has now become my saviour and the only one who can get me out of here before I turn into an aforementioned duty free package.

16:11 Wonder which stage of 15 I am at. Get ushered with N’s paperwork to see Assistant Commissioner again. He does not look up as he jabs the keyboard and says, ‘still here, eh?’ Respond with a ‘yes sir’ as I’ve now learnt N’s tricks and think this might be the only way to go. There is clearly a pecking order and I don’t think feature.

16:13 Go to a different room back near the packing area. The tip boys are hanging around outside pointing and nudging each other. The head honcho is in their sipping chai and does not looking up from his glossy magazine. Two others point at the form and say it is the wrong one. Another boy is sent to sort it out. Head honcho puts down his magazine and they proceed to chat about me. I trot out my one phrase meaning ‘I can speak a little Hindi’ and it earns me instant kudos. N nods approvingly. He has become my mentor and I, his disciple. Wonder if I might have been here a little too long.

16:45 Retrieve correct form and go to see the moody officail. I have seen him three times already today. The last two times we went to his office the security men stopped asking me for my pass. N leaves room. Officer asks me how long I will be in Indai. I respond I am working for an NGO for the next year. N returns and gets print out the officer has just executed from his computer. N waves it at me and winks from behind the official’s back.

16:54 N and I collect parcel and get one of the tip boys to carry it to an auto. Nearly cry with relief and tell N to write his email address so I can recommend him for promotion in what I promise to be the best recommendation email of my life. N sees me into an auto and I shake his hand vigorously. I can see in his eyes he knows he did good today and that he has witnessed another foreigner go through the rite of passage that is Indian customs. The parcel and I rattle around in the auto on the long journey home. Walk out of customs si hours after arriving. Feel like a changed woman.

We Can Work it Out...

I haven’t yet blogged about work yet and I guess it is time that I did as that is what I have come here to do. Although my CEO reads this so I will be careful about what I say! (joke!)

My overall feeling is one of enjoying my placement. The people are brilliant; I’m learning Indian Sign Language and people share their lunch. Well, these things are important! I was told before I started by the other Deafway volunteer that the staff liked Nutella sandwiches. Everyone here brings their own lunch in little tiffin boxes with chapattis wrapped in foil. The boxes usually have anything from mixed veg, Aloo Gobi and other veggie cooked stuff that tastes amazing and I can’t name. They hanker after my pasta, try my fishcakes and seem astounded if I manage to cook Indian. They also tell me everything needs more salt. They’re right.

Everything you are told in your VSO training, you are told for a reason. It is so easy to forget all of this when you start. The mantra is relationships are important, take time to build them, don’t be task-orientated, you are there to advise. How easy it is to get caught up in tasks rather than holding back and trying to see the bigger picture first. Anything done in the first month will inevitably be wrong as there is no way you will have understood the wider context, either of the organisation or the country.

Working here hasn’t been without its frustrations and that would be the biggest downside. The aim was to work alongside one Deaf person and one Interpreter to set up training. The interpreter left for a month to be with her husband and get pregnant and the Deaf person left for a government job. These are the two most highly prized things in Indian society: having children, more specifically a son, and having a job for life that comes with benefits. Sometimes I have to downgrade my expectations from what I thought I would achieve. The PHD won’t be on the cards just yet. I’m settling for creating partnerships and capacity in an interpreting organisation that will strengthen, influence and shape interpreting in India for hopefully years to come. Not that it is ‘settling’ for anything, it’s a tall order and slightly different from the original placement. I should have known. VSO told us it would happen. Cor, they know so much!

Looking back on my first two months in placement, there are times I feel I’ve achieved little but I know I’ve achieved more than is quantifiable in western terms. I’ve made contacts, built those oh-so-important relationships, read a lot and understand a lot more about the complicated context in which I will be working over the coming year. I work alongside my colleagues too and we discuss work problems. Some days it all feels normal then I look back at what I would have been doing in the UK and I know it is a cliche but I feel this immense privilege that I am here. Actually the first thought is usually...bloody hell!

Jaiho Jaipur

At the weekend a few of us went on a trip to Jaipur for a break out of the chaos that can be Delhi. We went to a literary festival at the Diggi Palace hosted by William Darymple. In it's 5th year, the festival was pretty well attended. As I'll be back in Jaipur in two weeks, I didn't see so much of the famous 'Pink City'. I did get time to find out about the Camel Festival in March with an Elephant Festival later on in the festvial season. Only 6 hours away from Delhi, it was a good escape and the bus was cheap. Even the deluxe version was good and nicer than the train.

Other writers in attendance were Roddy Doyle, Hanif Kureshi, Niall Ferguson, Shoma Chaudhury (Editor of Tehelka magazine), Ayaan Hirsi Ali (living under a Fatwa for speaking out against Islam) and many others. There was a special focus on Dalit literature, also known as the 'untouchable' caste. At times it felt like literature was the new Rock n' Roll for the middle classes.

The cars still honked. There were still no pavements. We were treated like tourists. It was all somehow different though. We swanned around pretending we were on holiday. We ate dinner and drank beer in rooftop bars. We shopped and took photographs. Coming back I felt different about Delhi. A sort of calm resignation that this was where I lived and it wasn't so bad at all. Perhaps it is because Delhi may be starting to feel like home.

Bollywood: Aquafresh on Acid

Coming up to three months in India it was about time I went to see my first Bollywood movie. The film everyone is talking about here is The 3 Idiots. This is modern Bollywood but it’s indisputably Bollywood all the same. The Indian cinema experience is strange. No laptops, cameras or chewing gum. You get turned away or these things get taken away if you have any on your possession as you go through the airport style security. Ladies to the left, gentlemen to the right.

Inside, the reclining seats are pretty plush for what amounts to less than a few quid. Once I’d tuned in to some of the Hindi, I started to relax and enjoy the film. I got the gist of it. With the visual gags and the occasional bits of English dialogue it was easier to pick up the clues. Some was lost on me in the nuances of language but having done my research I hung on in there. Of course the songs and dance routines were entertaining. Seeing grown men dancing around in towels, breaking into song whilst brushing their teeth was a bit like watching the 1980s Aquafresh advert on acid. The next morning in my kitchen I was waiting for the kettle to boil. I couldn’t place the strange lyrics that seemed catchier than an S Club 7 hit. It took me a while to realise what I’d been singing but then I’m never that good in the mornings.

Bollywood films are famous for not displaying sex. Too taboo in India. This is a country where apparently no-one has sex before marriage but the numbers of teenage abortions are sky-rocketing. On screen, in the 1970s, there were apparently careful visualisations instead. Just when you’re expecting the main characters to get it on, a flower may appear instead to blossom or be pollinated by a bee before normality resumed. I was a bit surprised then when the main couple broke out into song and suddenly had on flimsy clothes. They were dancing, it rained. Soon they were bouncing around and their clothes went see-through. Easier to imagine what could happen next then without the Chelsea Flower Show type display.

The storyline was pretty diverse and epic. There was the whole gamut of emotions: birth, illness, death (not just one), a funeral, a near marriage and lots of men crying. The main character was nearly superhuman. He saved several lives. This included saving a baby and its labouring mother by building, A-Team stylee, a vacuum pump from a Hoover to suck out the stuck child. In nearly three hours the audience had the entire spectrum of the human experience.

The film may have been cheesier than the Stilton I crave but it was all fun. The scenery was stunning and I’ll definitely be jetting off to Leh soon. This is westernised Bollywood and I loved it. That, folks, was what you’d call entertainment and it’s currently showing in 53 cinemas in the UK.

Shut up and Drive

(Pic from: http://rickshawchallenge.com/blog/)

It’s official, auto drivers have become the bane of my life. I’ve spent three patient months trying to understand but they are an alien breed to me. You think you’ll get there for 40 rupees. They want 80. But then there’s the 100% mark up to factor in. It’s the skin tax. A local friend told me his wife, having lived here for 25 odd years still pays it.

You think if you speak Hindi you might get say, a discounted 50% skin tax. They think you’re cute. The next question is inevitably, “Shaddi-shudda hai?” No I’m not married but I am sane. I don’t know this in Hindi so the last time this happened I ended up married with 10 children.

I tend to give people the benefit of the doubt. Not anymore, it’s war. No more ‘Yes your medicine costs 200 rupees’ knowing I’ll get asked at the end to pay for it. Note to self: learn Hindi for: ‘I won’t be paying for that’.

Most people in my office use Indian Sign Language and English. Everyone in Delhi speaks some English. My Hindi improves slowly due to lack of use. I’m from the UK too, I like pavements and walking. Neither are seen as necessary in Delhi so I have to get in an auto now and again. When I do, I find myself putting on the don’t-mess-with-me-face. It doesn’t work. Within thirty seconds it’s ‘where are you from?’ Reply in Hindi, they think I’m cute, they ask if I’m married. See second paragraph. The first few times I played along. Once I got assaulted. Well he did that thing that boys used to do in the playground at school to make you feel sick. They shake your hand then wiggle their index finger on your palm as an indication they want to have sex. I nearly threw up on the spot and the driver couldn’t stop laughing at my face which had ‘No!!!’ written all over it.

In the UK we chat to our taxi drivers. We talk shit and banter. We swap stories. They tell you about the celebrities they had in their cab last week. Not here. Not that Bollywood celebs would be seen dead in an auto anyway. It’s no more Hindi practice in autos now. It’s no more Mr Nice Guy. Charge me skin tax? You can shut up and drive.