"There There" or Snowfall and Shadow

Bundled up, I wandered down the streets in my neighborhood tonight/early this morning. Heavy snow fell in soft clusters all day, but the sky was clear when I stepped out onto my porch. Icicles hanging from the roofline formed an elegant row and the mountains glowed white against the dark blue sky. When you are out in freshly fallen snow the silence echoes. There are no identifiable sounds but my ears register that low nothingness that hums around my body.

Walking alone, at night, doesn’t seem to be a particularly good idea, but sometimes when your body and nature connect it feels like the two shouldn’t be separated. It is a force that wraps around you and pulls you with its gentle song into the night.

As I walked, I thought about how God and I have been having bad communication lately. Somehow I got the wrong impression about a few, critical plot points on the life chart and I have found myself back at the drafting table, with my compass and scale rule, trying to figure out how I managed to miscalculate. To return to the first square is daunting. It isn’t just one page, it is a whole portfolio of false starts and failed plans that lead to a life that isn’t mine. The drafting isn’t completely my own, others have contributed, but I can’t sort it all out. Hoping for divine intervention I shuffle forward; the sky is clear but markedly silent. So I watch my shadow in front of me to see where it will go next.

India

I am in India. Crazy I know. I am still getting used to the idea. Today we travelled from Delhi to Chennai on Jet Airways and arrived in 53 degree weather. Don't worry, that is in Celsius. (That is another way of saying hot as a sauna.) Before we got here we spent the night in Delhi and the most memorable parts about it were the pre-paid taxi service from the airport to the hotel. On the way to the hotel I realized that Indian traffic regulations are more like suggestions rather than rules. The drivers just pour down the road like a flood of water filling in any empty spaces that appear. There is driving between lanes and the lines painted on the road to separate them are just decoration with no special significance. About thirty times on the short ride to the hotel I was sure the driver was going to hit another car. We are talking about centimeters between the cars! While all of this is going on a symphony of beeping horns at all varieties of volume and pitch are blurting out their solos. At both destinations I was thrilled at the fact that we had made it and not killed anyone, including ourselves. The ride back to the airport was just as crazy. This time we had a Sikh man with a white beard and a brown turban driving us. When he missed a turn on a five lane highway he just backed up 100 yards and made the turn. Liann and I both busted up laughing.

Tonight I had my first Tamil meal. We ordered rice and a variety of sauces and it came out on a banana leaf. We ate with our right hand, scooping the rice and sauce and pushing it into our mouths. The place was recommended to us by some people in the BYU Field Studies office, but it seemed sort of shady. I hope I am not super sick tomorrow. I avoided the curd.... largely because I have seen where the cows hang out around here.

Indians seem to live very closely with animals. Last night I heard a pig, several kinds of birds and a pack of semi-wild dogs outside of our hotel window. The first animal I saw was actually a white cow being led down the street of hotels. So surreal. When we rode the train from the Chennai Airport to Egmore (another area of hotels near a train station) I got a chance to see a bit of the city. The cars are segregated by sex, this is a good thing, considering men are notorious for "Eve Teasing" which is essentially sexual harassment. The train was like most city metros, pretty dirty and worn from use. The major difference was that they didn't close the doors of the train. The train began to move and drove at full force with the doors wide open. Although with no place to sit (the seats were filled with women wearing simply beautiful saris of purple, green, gold, orange, and white with decorative patterns) we stood in the doorway holding on to the metal poles, I was grateful for the open doors. With back packs on the front and back of us that weighed 60+ lbs. we were sweating pretty hard. Outside the train we saw housing that ranged from thatched roof shacks to palacial buildings that must have belonged to a Raja before they were abandoned. We passed a bunch of young men playing cricket in a barren patch of land and 5 black cows grazing in the outfield.

I wish I had pictures, it was pretty amazing.

The diversity of people is astounding. There are Sikhs marked by their turbans and uncut hair. I have seen a few women in the full berka with only eye slits to prove that there was a person inside. Most women wear saris and nearly 90% of the men wear collared shirts and khakis, like Westerners. As I am sitting here I can hear the call to prayer outside of the internet cafe. Religious diversity abounds! I have to run, but I will keep you up to date as much as possible! Lots of love!