As of tonight, it will have been a week since I arrived in Bangalore. Today I finally snapped. I found myself yelling at people in my head. Why are you honking at me? I'm the only one on the roadside and there's plenty of room to go around...
No, I don't need want to go shopping, I just want to walk.
Oh, so you only serve this page at lunch time. Then can I have this soup? ... Wait, only dosas? Okay, does a plain dosa have anything in it? No?? These are just fried bread! (This wasn't so silent a reaction, and I noticeably put off the other two I was having lunch with. :-/)
For a vegetarian population, South Indians barely get any vegetables in their diet. You either have to buy them raw at the market or go to the Punjabi or North Indian restaurants. Rice, bread, fried bread, fried rice: this covers 95% of all meals in Bangalore, with a little curd or chutney on the side. And chai, of course; it's impossible to find tea or coffee without milk. Fruit is easy to come by, though. There are fruit stands and juicers everywhere. I really want to assemble a press when I return so I can have fresh mango or pineapple juice for breakfast everyday.
My classmates seem to be enjoying this country more than I. I feel trapped, on so many levels. Bangalore is not the boomtown I'd imagined. Rhetoric aside, it truly is a developing nation, but I have a hard time imagining it "the Silicon Valley" it is oft touted as. What's really eating me is that I can't be myself here. My mere presence invites trouble. I have to be back at the dorm by 7 or 8 p.m. if I'm alone and want to preserve my safety. I can't make too much eye contact, not even to dismiss the cat-callers or stares. I have to think about what I'm wearing everyday, not based on style but on how much skin I'm showing or whether my curves are showing.
Living here as a woman, as a white Western woman, is exhausting, infuriating, and dehumanizing.
And yet for all the complaints I can conjure, I still have privileges, as a white Western woman. I may feel restricted, but I can buy whatever I like, take a rickshaw wherever I want and eat whatever I please. And I can always leave.
Heh, but I won't! Not for another three weeks. We've got a 10-hour train ride leaving tonight for Belgaum to attend a Dalit feminist federation meeting (Dalits are the lowest in the caste system; also called "the Untouchables"). This will be my first train ride, ever. I look forward to very little sleep.
Awwwwwww, hang in there. You know what would help? Ride an elephant. I don't think it's physically possible to be unhappy while riding an elephant. I think they did a study and everything.
ReplyDeleteWhat day are you coming home, again? I'm pretty sure some sort of sweet party needs to happen on or around that day.
Just wait till you get to Tokyo in a few weeks! It's all pikachu's, beer vending machines, school girls in tight outfits, and western influence there. :)
ReplyDelete*Hugs!* It's gonna get better soon Twinkie, don't you worry! Just keep your spirits up, like the irrepressible Twinkie we all know and love! <33
ReplyDeleteWow, somehow I'm not surprised at all that it's like that. I always wondered though if I was just imagining that they would treat females oddly. Good luck and keep learning awesome stuff!
ReplyDeleteI don't know you. I stumbled upon your blog when I was searching for "Hampi" on Twitter. Unbelievable, this statement: 'South Indians barely get any vegetables in their diet.' I am surprised, considering that Bangalore has some of the best South Indian restaurants in India! Clearly, you have been going to all the wrong places for food. I am a cut-me-I-bleed-Kannada South Indian and a Bangalorean currently living in the US, and I rarely eat anything other than South Indian food, growing up on it. Vegetables and lentils are essentially the heart and soul of South Indian food. In the last 1 week, I have had at least 6 different vegetables (including greens) and 4 different lentils for lunch and dinner. Each meal in a typical South Indian home has at least 3 types of vegetables, and one type of lentil, along with rice and yogurt. I can't think of anything healthier. Hope you can find better restaurants in the future! Besides, a "dosa" is NOT fried bread, being more akin to a pancake or a French crepe, the only difference being that the batter used here is made of ground lentils.
ReplyDeleteApart from that, yes, Bangalore is become yet another cosmopolitan city, a far cry from the sleepy, friendly, bourgeois town it was till the early 2000s. Its population has doubled since. It's now like 1900s London, or New York City. Often, we can find solace in seeing things in the bigger perspective- In this case, what you see today is just another phase in the city's history. I hope you have a nice trip!
Thanks for the comment, karatalaamalaka. I should clarify: when I say Bangalore, I mean the area of Benson Town my college is in (near Millers Road).
ReplyDeleteIt is true that I am simply living in a phase of this city. I can only see things from my perspective after all, I acknowledge this. My teacher has told us that our restaurant diet isn't entirely accurate of the normal South Indian intake. She says South Indians do eat veggies but that they aren't served as much outside because it's safer to cook grains and pulses and more expensive to prepare other things.
Just last night I met some people from Delhi that moved down to Bangalore three years ago, and they gave me some good recommendations for restaurants in my area. So hopefully I'll have better experiences! Thanks again for taking the time to write and read. :)