Post 6

I am very sorry it has been so long sense I have blogged. I was caught up in school work when our courses were wrapping up in Jaipur and once I reached my internship I have had no Internet or cell phone services. So I hope this will make up for some lost time.

Sept. 28-30
We had a overnight weekend fieldtrip to the region of Shekhawati in northern Rajasthan. The hotel we stayed at was really nice and even had a pool. It was nice to be able to take a swim. We visited an organic farm training center run by the Morarka Foundation as well as visited a large family farm connected with the foundation. It was really interesting to learn about some of the organic farming techniques. The foundation was actually pretty large scale and sold most of its production to overseas markets where organic foods make better profits.

During our trip we also visited an old haveli which we got to explore, the architecture and paintings where really neat. I wish my whole family could move into one, cousins and all.

Oct. 2nd-3rd

Yes that is the real Taj Mahal. It almost didn’t even look real when we were standing right in front of it. I can really see why it is such a big attraction of India. I have a lot more pictures that I can show all of you when I get home. In Agra we also visited Agra fort which had a really cool view of the Taj next to the river. After our day trip to Agra we spent the night at a hostel in Bharatpur. There we visited a bird sanctuary. It was like a large state park. We wanted to rent bikes so we could bike around and see more of the park but they were already all sold out for the day. but just walking around, it was really nice to see some Indian wildlife.

On the 9th of October a group of us went to Chokhi Dhani in the evening. It is on the outskirts of Jaipur and is kind of like a theme park except it embraces Rajasthan culture. We ate really good traditional food and went on a manual fairs-wheel ride which was run by a man climbing in-between the spokes of the fairs-wheel. we also watched dances, a magic show and went on a elephant ride. This actually made me quiet sad because the elephant looked very unhappy.

The Next day we went to a Dandhiya festival in Jaipur. It is a traditional dance of Gujarat, the state just south of us. We watched the experienced dancers in their elaborate consumes and even got to try it out for ourselves in the beginners circle. It was a local festival so we were the only foreigners there. Which happens a lot, so natural we attracted a lot of attention and even got an interview with the media, however I don’t think we actually made the news.

October 14-17 was our long weekend off of class so a group of 10 of us headed to Jaisalmer. We took an overnight sleeper bus to Jaisalmer and then had to take a local bus to a village outside the city called Khuri where we were going on an overnight camel safari. The bus we took was actually extremely over packed with people so some of us ended up riding up on the roof of the bus. We were traveling like Indians. Plus there was a nice breeze and it wasn’t stuffy like the inside, although it was just as crowded. Don’t worry there was a small sort of guard rail to hang on to for life.

We took off from for our safari in the afternoon. Camels are big and very bouncy, especially when they run. We stopped at a well to fill up with water then headed out into the dunes. The dunes weren’t like that of what you would think would be in a desert. They were sparsely scattered between grasses and small brush. We stopped in a small village of about 300 people all living in small mud-dung plaster huts that are a common site around the state. Then we raced the sunset and settled on some dunes for the night. We ate dinner and then played games in the dunes with our guides like tag and sardines. It was a lot of fun. We slept on blankets on the dunes. At night it got really cold and after the moon set the sky lit up with stairs scattered across the Milkyway. The next day we packed up and ended our safari but the adventure. We bus backed to Jaisalmer and spent the night.

Before our bus left for Jaipur six of us rented scooters for a few hours. We had a little bit of a rough start getting use to driving them but then we took off. We drove down to the lake in Jaisalmer which was very pretty and then set out to find a temple on the outskirts of the city. We found the temple where the temple was but didn’t actually make it there because we found a secret garden in a village that a man let us into there was a hidden pool with a bunch of young local kids swimming. I wish we would have brought our swimming suits.

The 19th was our last day of class before we all headed off for our independent internships around the state. I know I left a lot of information out about what has been going on in the class room in my blog. It’s not really the exciting part about being in India and there are not many stories to tell without making things too boring for a blog post. I have learned a lot about development in India and around the globe. I have also come to understand a little bit more about Indian history and culture. I know a lot more Hindi now then I knew when I arrived but I still don’t feel like it’s enough to socialize with. It was a short amount of time but a lot of information has been stuffed into my brain.

The Internship Phase

On the 20th I took a car to Udaipur with a few other students who are interning in the area. By the evening of the 21st I was in Ogna Village. I am working for an NGO called the Gandhi Manav Kalyan Society (GMKS) in the field of organic agriculture. I am here with one other intern, Sam, from my program. For the time being we are working at the Dharamitra which is an organic agricultural farm and training center. Dharamitra means ‘friend of soil’. GMKS also does other work with village and tribes people including water and natural resource management, and human resource, tribal, child, women and community development. I will be working here until December 3rd. It is a short amount of time for an internship but I think I will be able to accomplish and learn a lot.