A week in India

Well, this post isn’t really about London, but it doesn’t really belong on the travel blog as it’s just one post, so I’ll keep it here. Last week was my one week trip to India for a conference and lecture. Insane stuff! I think the whole trip and the vast cultural differences between India and most other places I’ve been was only amplified by the fact I’ve been living in London the last 5 months. India is a whole new world. Really. It reminded me at times of Indonesia, but this place was even more crazy than that. That may have been due to the fact that I wasn’t staying at fancy resorts and Nash wasn’t with me to help me keep a positive attitude and I was in some pretty rural parts of India, but regardless, this place was really something.

I had a great set of flights to India. Easy flight to Frankfurt in the AM. Then, a 9.5 hour flight to India. I watched two movies (Tammy and Locke) and wrote my first talk (the 90 minute one). I took a few little naps, but since I was arriving at midnight, I wanted to be tired, so I tried to stay awake. The time went by quickly. Chennai airport was kind of a bust. The immigration guy didn’t like that I didn’t have my conference invitation letter with me. I wanted to punch him after all the chaos I went through to get my CONFERENCE visa in the first place. I found a somewhat recent email with a few details, but couldn’t find the invitation letter. He eventually gave in and let me in to his country. Ugh!

Then, it was the first of  many horn-honking adventures through the city to a local hotel. This place was nice, but the bathroom was weird. I later found out it was a pretty standard bathroom. Tile floor. Shower head in the middle of the room. Buckets. Lots of buckets. Spray hose next to toilet. But, there was toilet paper, which I later realized was a real treat. I didn’t take a shower that day because I had no idea how to get that to work. No biggie though as I was just there to sleep and continue my flights the next morning.

10AM flight the next day to Madurai. Another easy flight and no problems there. Professor Arumugam met me at the airport and we headed off to get some lunch at a local Indian restaurant. You have to decide: veg or non-veg. I went non-veg. So, we had some chicken soup, chicken biranyi and some little fried chicken nugget things. All very tasty, but a bit spicy.



After that it was a 2.5 hour drive to the university town where I’d be delivering my first lecture. Holy crazy car ride! So much livestock in the roads! Cows, goats, dogs, chickens. And traffic knows no direction. People travel in whatever lane they want just constantly honking their horns. No seat belts. Just utter chaos. So many scooters too…that reminded me of Indonesia. We got to our hotel and this one had no toilet paper in the bathroom, but did have a curtain surrounding the shower area, so that was nice. Had tea w/ my host. Then, rested a bit before heading to a Hindu temple and dinner. The temple was small and about 1500 years old, but it had the most amazing statues carved out of stone! Like one giant stone pillar would be turned into like these 3 elaborate sculptures. We had a private tour by flashlight. Really something. Then, it was time for dinner at a nearby hotel restaurant. This time we did vegetarian. Got something with peas in it and multiple orders of butter naan. I love me some naan. I would eat that all day every day, but apparently they only eat it at night. Ridiculous! People in India also eat with their hands. Fascinating! I tried it, but I felt like I was getting stuff all up in my fingernails and stuff  and that grossed me out, so I didn’t do that much after that. After dinner, we went to a big department store. My host REALLY wanted me to buy some children’s clothing, but I couldn’t remember how old my niece and nephew were (6 and 7 or 7 and 8?), so I kept saying no, but he really wanted me to buy something so I picked out a skirt for myself that was maybe $4. He insisted on buying it. Very nice of him, but unnecessary.

In India, they have 14 official languages. They all appear on their bills.

Tuesday it was time for my talk at the university. But, before that, we went to another temple. This one was HUGE! These things are so impressive and they are filled with people worshiping. No pictures allowed, but you wouldn’t want to take them anyways and disrupt the peaceful nature of these people and their temple. While walking along one corridor, we ran across an elephant! A live, decorated elephant! I gave him a few rupees in his trunk, and he patted my head w/ his trunk. A blessing from an elephant. Super cool. Apparently this is good luck for new beginnings or something. Quite cool. The guy in front of me got some water splashed in his face by the elephant. I passed on that.

Then, it was time for my lecture. This was part of an Endowed Lecture Series for my host, Professor Arumugam. He turns 70 soon and he’s published hundreds of papers and dozens of books. A real celebrity on this campus for sure. Students kept coming up to him to say hi. This was the 10^th such lecture and I feel honored to have been invited to give the address. I gave my lecture of 90 minutes, but not before a huge ceremony. Complete with decorations on the walls, a presentation of a gift to me, and me having to give some sort of welcome remarks (which I wasn’t prepared for). Then, tea break. Then my 90 minute talk. I did pretty well at keeping it right at 90 minutes. Boom! Then, a trophy presentation! A trophy! For giving a talk! Crazy stuff.

After that, it was a 2.5 hour drive to Kalasalingham University which is where I would be staying for the rest of my visit.

We arrived in time for dinner and for me to see my face on a huge poster. My accommodations here were in between the two hotels. The bathroom looked more like the first place and had a bit of toilet paper. But, no wi-fi. I had to survive 5 days without it! I am thankful for my T-mobile coverage that supplied me w/ enough internet to sometimes check email and post on Facebook. I’m pretty sure I would have died if I didn’t have my phone. Oh…the water here wasn’t very hot either. This wasn’t a huge deal as I ran a couple of mornings so I was warm from my run. But the other mornings, that shower was a bit cold.

Wednesday-Saturday was conference. I won’t bore you with those details. I’ll just say I love this conference because I understand probably 98% of what is presented and that’s rare at a math conference! It’s so in my super sub-discipline and I love that. So great! I met many Indian mathematicians that want to collaborate with me. They want to come to the US. They want me to come stay with them for many weeks in India. And I met some other graph labeling celebs that I had only seen their names. Great stuff! I am thankful that Southwestern was able to partially support me in this adventure. I also got a fancy trophy for my talk here! With my face on it! Amazing! I also went for a couple runs. On my run around the track on Friday morning, a peacock ran across my path! Wild peacocks! Super fun!

We had a couple of cultural events during the conference. On Wednesday, it was another temple. On Thursday night, we got to see some Indian dance. Fancy stuff!

Overall thoughts on India:

Food: The food was tasty, but it was like the same thing for 3 meals a day. Rice, some sort of bread, some sort of veggies in a sauce usually somewhat spicy. It got really old after a day or two. So, imagine 6 days of it! We had meat twice. Chicken one meal and mutton at lunch on the last day. I’m so excited for a burger. And wine. I miss wine. The other bust about the food is that it’s likely not prepped in the same conditions we would prep in the US. I found hair in my food a couple of times and a dead bug once. I kept eating because I didn’t want to be rude and leave food on my plate. It was not fun. BUT, on the bright side I didn’t get sick! I drank/brushed teeth w/ bottled water and tried not too have the super spicy stuff. So far, so good!

Clothing: loved the Indian saris. The women were always so fancy looking. I don’t love the diaper looking things that some men wear. Weird. If you go to India…bring sandals. Or slip ons (like Toms). I brought my Bobs and a pair of boots. I wore the boots one day and never again. Ridiculous. Also, I brought a dress, but felt weird wearing it. So, I just kept wearing my jeans and wrinkly t-shirts. Oh well. The other non-Indian woman that was at the conference did wear dresses the last two days. I guess I could have too, but it just felt out of place. OH and I would have been covered in bug bites on my legs. I have a ton of them on my ankles and wrists from when I wasn’t covered up all the way at night standing outside trying to get 3G service to send an email or too. Sigh.

Chaos: Chaos. Always. On the streets. At the conference, nothing started on time. There was not even a schedule posted or printed in the program book! During talks people were constantly chatting with each other. Phones go off all the time and people answer them! In the middle of meetings, talks, anything! It’s insane. My structured, organized personality about lost it many times. I tried to just relax, but I wanted to tell people to shut up. I also eventually just started showing up 10-15 minutes late. OH and some times the power would go out. This only happened once during a talk, but definitely some times at breakfast or while waiting for talks to start. Awesome.

It was fun to visit. It was fun to see a very different world than the one I live in. It was nice to think about all the things I have in my life and learn to appreciate them even more. I’d have a hard time going back, but then I read an article on the plane about tigers and seeing them in the wild…in India. Hmm…I might need to come back for that. Or maybe to see a metropolitan area. But, I'm not sure about rural India. Maybe in a few years. And with a friend.