The Sari Incident

7/16/10 - 4pm

This morning I wore my sari to school. A lot of the teachers at school were surprised to know that I had a sari and they encouraged me to wear it today so I did. I put it on the best I could and figured that if I had made a mistake the women would fix it. Well, I got to school and they immediately went into a frenzy around me. First, they were excited to see me wearing a sari and then they not-so-gently broke the news that I was wearing it all wrong. So right in the middle of the ladies' staff lounge they took the entire sari off and put it on for me correctly. I was given a bindi to wear and my cooperating teacher lent me her necklace… and there was some confusion about why I wasn't wearing earrings… I am guessing jewelry is a mandatory accessory in India!

In India, schools have something called morning assembly. It is approximately 15 minutes long, and during that time the students have prayer, the teacher takes attendance, everybody sings the national anthem, and announcements are made, and a whole bunch of other stuff. Yesterday I was supposed to have my official welcome during morning assembly, but unfortunately our taxi driver got completely lost and I was about 45 minutes late to school. So today, I got my official welcome. It was very exciting! I got some lovely flowers and I made a short speech to all the students- there are a couple thousand!- and everybody afterwards said I did a great job.

Now that my presence is known at my school, I am in high demand. All day I had groups of kids coming up to me and saying "Good morning ma'am, are you free now to come to visit our class?" And if I am, I go along… and if not I tell them to keep trying to find me. It is very sweet and heartwarming that they are so curious and excited to get to know me. I feel very lucky to be put in a position where I am treated so nicely, and for no real reason other than I'm a guest and I’m American. It really makes me feel very optimistic about the fate of the human race, the kindness that people are showing towards me in India.

I spent quite a long time today answering questions about America and my school. Kind of like what I did yesterday, but way more of it. The main point I am trying to drive home to the students is that when comparing India and America, neither is "better" or "worse," we are just different. And if one person prefers India to America, or has a preference for certain aspects of either culture, that is just their personal opinion.

Now it's the weekend- in a little while we're going over to Connaught Place, one of the big commerce areas of New Delhi. There, we'll pick up copies of the KV textbooks to use while we're here and take home to show our home schools. Of course there will be other shopping as well, and then we'll probably have dinner over there before… who knows? But the best part of the weekend will surely be sleeping in and having breakfast at the hotel. I've been having takeout breakfast, which is a few pieces of fruit and a croissant, but NO COFFEE! I don't know how I'm surviving! (OH WAIT- THE CHAI!!)

Also, I'm looking forward to seeing more of Delhi this weekend- we're going to a bunch of sites tomorrow on a tour that's being arranged for us so I will be taking lots of pictures! There are lots of places I'd love to see- Delhi is such a fascinating city with so much history, tracing its roots back to Ancient Indian mythology and encompassing so many different cultures- I am so excited to actually see these places that I've read so much about.


The good times keep on coming!