A little taste of my recent trip to southern India to play for New Delhi's ultimate -
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vyjJK3iJx34&feature=related
More later.
Tuesday, March 30, 2010
Thursday, March 11, 2010
My trip to Punjab
As some of you know - I was in Punjab for two weeks recently. The purpose of the trip was a standard EMI project trip that consists of visiting the owner's site, sitting with the owner and hearing his vision, surveying the site, and then working with client, coming up with conceptual civil and architectural plans that encompass the entirety of his vision and purpose. That's the short of it. Since there is never much structural work to do on the physical project trip and there were already 3 civil engineers, I was in charge of surveying the site. This particular project is a children's home and school that is intended for village kids in this particular region of Punjab that is primarily Sikh. The children's home will eventually house around 200 to 250 orphans while the day school will provide an education for countless more. When we arrived the ground floor of the chilren's home had actually been started. It was after a couple bad encounters with others that the client decided to contact EMI and ask for their guidance. There were crazy things going on for sure - like a 20ft deep septic tank that was 56x times bigger than it should have been.
Leading the survey team and constantly being out on the site allowed me to interact a lot with the contractor and the different construction workers. My Hindi is rudimentary at best, but it was enough to communicate with them. Plus they thought it was hilarious to see an Indian that didn't speak Hindi well. I had to explain to them that there are lots of Indians that don't speak Hindi, including many people in Tamil Nadu. Also, without a doubt, within 2 minutes of beginning a conversation with me they would ask - "Have you finished your marriage?" As individual upon individual kept asking, I eventually would just start laughing at the question, knowing that it was coming. Do I look like I should be married already? Am I in that desperate of a situation?
All in all, the couple of weeks went very smoothly. It wasn't as exciting as my trip last term to the orphanage (where the kids were actually there) but this particular trip is much more representative of what EMI does. We come in at the beginning stages, before things get too exciting, and partner with ministry using our knowledge to make sure they're making wise decisions. They're the ones on the frontlines, we're just here in whatever capacity they need. Coming back to the office, I'll be working on the structural assessment for the building that's currently under construction plus a water tower (that the clients wants to also contain prayer rooms) design that should be built as soon as I turn over the drawings.
We also had the opportunity to see a couple of the more exciting things Punjab has to offer - the India-Pakistan border closing ceremony and the Golden Temple. The Golden Temple was the Golden Temple. I thought it was beautiful and enjoyed it but I wouldn't say it affected me in any significant way. However, the border closing ceremony was a completely different affair. A lot of people have been talking it up for a while now (including some of you reading this). If you have no idea what I'm talking about, I suggest you jump on youtube really quick and find a video of it. (I'd give you a link but the internet connection here makes using youtube completely impossible) It's a cultural experience that is culturally unique to India/Pakistan. Thousands upon thousands (I mean tens of thousands) of people come to this one point on the border between India and Pakistan. Grandstands, gigantic arches, ornate gates, heavy security lie on either side of the line. There is a single paved road that passes through these gates and on either side are people dances with flags, a man with a microphone pushing the crowds to chant louder and louder. Border guards come out and undergo a passionate, lively ceremony as they open the gates, allow the last bus to cross the border and then lower their flags for the day, trying to keep their flag up just a fraction of a second longer than the other. Each crowd passionately shouts, yelling, jeers as they try and drown out the opposing side. Over the barbed wire, the armed guards, the large walls, you can just see the tops of the other grandstands, the people that inhabit this other land. While it's very easy to get caught up in the electric atmosphere of it all there is something deeply saddening about all of this. If you were to stand on the wall separating the two countries the differences would seem pretty shallow while the similarities would seem much more significant. You have two sets of guards doing the exact same things. One group dressed in brown, the other in black. You have the same amount of noise, the same kind of cheers - one in Hindi, one in Urdu. You have one ornate gate that slides open, another that opens like a double door. Where else in the world could you get two different people groups from two different nations to buy into something as crazy and as outrageous as something like this? Probably nowhere. That's essentially because these were never intended to be two separate nations in the first place. The line between Pakistan and India was arbitrarily drawn, leaving families stuck on either side. Permanently split up fearing the consequences of trying to cross the border during Partition or even now. Sitting there, listening to people yell 'Jai India' at Pakistan, it forces you to reflect on the non-silly aspects of Indo-Pakistan relations - the millions of lives lost, the families ruined, the blood split over this conflict. It shouldn't be this way. I'm not trying to argue for the merging of Pakistan into India. I'm not talking about political borders here. Whether or not they are one country or two separate countries is really irrelevant in the face of what I'm talking about. This isn't like the US and Mexico, these are the same people that have a similar cultural and ethnic background. It's no accident that India's muslim population is the 3rd largest in the world, just under Pakistan. Really, it's just tragic. It's tragic that it couldn't have been different from the very beginning. If this precedent of rivalry and hatred was never established, if boys and girls weren't brought up learning about this tradition of intolerance. Because after all, these are the same people.
Leading the survey team and constantly being out on the site allowed me to interact a lot with the contractor and the different construction workers. My Hindi is rudimentary at best, but it was enough to communicate with them. Plus they thought it was hilarious to see an Indian that didn't speak Hindi well. I had to explain to them that there are lots of Indians that don't speak Hindi, including many people in Tamil Nadu. Also, without a doubt, within 2 minutes of beginning a conversation with me they would ask - "Have you finished your marriage?" As individual upon individual kept asking, I eventually would just start laughing at the question, knowing that it was coming. Do I look like I should be married already? Am I in that desperate of a situation?
All in all, the couple of weeks went very smoothly. It wasn't as exciting as my trip last term to the orphanage (where the kids were actually there) but this particular trip is much more representative of what EMI does. We come in at the beginning stages, before things get too exciting, and partner with ministry using our knowledge to make sure they're making wise decisions. They're the ones on the frontlines, we're just here in whatever capacity they need. Coming back to the office, I'll be working on the structural assessment for the building that's currently under construction plus a water tower (that the clients wants to also contain prayer rooms) design that should be built as soon as I turn over the drawings.
We also had the opportunity to see a couple of the more exciting things Punjab has to offer - the India-Pakistan border closing ceremony and the Golden Temple. The Golden Temple was the Golden Temple. I thought it was beautiful and enjoyed it but I wouldn't say it affected me in any significant way. However, the border closing ceremony was a completely different affair. A lot of people have been talking it up for a while now (including some of you reading this). If you have no idea what I'm talking about, I suggest you jump on youtube really quick and find a video of it. (I'd give you a link but the internet connection here makes using youtube completely impossible) It's a cultural experience that is culturally unique to India/Pakistan. Thousands upon thousands (I mean tens of thousands) of people come to this one point on the border between India and Pakistan. Grandstands, gigantic arches, ornate gates, heavy security lie on either side of the line. There is a single paved road that passes through these gates and on either side are people dances with flags, a man with a microphone pushing the crowds to chant louder and louder. Border guards come out and undergo a passionate, lively ceremony as they open the gates, allow the last bus to cross the border and then lower their flags for the day, trying to keep their flag up just a fraction of a second longer than the other. Each crowd passionately shouts, yelling, jeers as they try and drown out the opposing side. Over the barbed wire, the armed guards, the large walls, you can just see the tops of the other grandstands, the people that inhabit this other land. While it's very easy to get caught up in the electric atmosphere of it all there is something deeply saddening about all of this. If you were to stand on the wall separating the two countries the differences would seem pretty shallow while the similarities would seem much more significant. You have two sets of guards doing the exact same things. One group dressed in brown, the other in black. You have the same amount of noise, the same kind of cheers - one in Hindi, one in Urdu. You have one ornate gate that slides open, another that opens like a double door. Where else in the world could you get two different people groups from two different nations to buy into something as crazy and as outrageous as something like this? Probably nowhere. That's essentially because these were never intended to be two separate nations in the first place. The line between Pakistan and India was arbitrarily drawn, leaving families stuck on either side. Permanently split up fearing the consequences of trying to cross the border during Partition or even now. Sitting there, listening to people yell 'Jai India' at Pakistan, it forces you to reflect on the non-silly aspects of Indo-Pakistan relations - the millions of lives lost, the families ruined, the blood split over this conflict. It shouldn't be this way. I'm not trying to argue for the merging of Pakistan into India. I'm not talking about political borders here. Whether or not they are one country or two separate countries is really irrelevant in the face of what I'm talking about. This isn't like the US and Mexico, these are the same people that have a similar cultural and ethnic background. It's no accident that India's muslim population is the 3rd largest in the world, just under Pakistan. Really, it's just tragic. It's tragic that it couldn't have been different from the very beginning. If this precedent of rivalry and hatred was never established, if boys and girls weren't brought up learning about this tradition of intolerance. Because after all, these are the same people.
Thursday, March 4, 2010
Resolute Aging
Tonight, our chokedar (basically the guy that takes care of our house and property) told me all about his dream motorcycle trip around India. We stood in front of a map of India as his finger ran from road to road, tracing the border of the entire sub-continent. He talked about how long each stint would take, where he would stay, the people he would meet, the food he would eat. He talked about the equipment he would bring. All the details, even the details that only come to mind after years and years of thinking were already worked out in his head. He told me about his dream to reach Rajastan (India’s desert state) during the peak of summer when temperatures will easily reach 50C (120F). I laughed because that may literally be impossible. Undaunted, he simply responded with, “Impossible is good. If it wasn’t impossible, everyone would do it.”
I think I had slowly started to believe that youth had a monopoly on dreaming. Certainly most people would reinforce that, telling me how my high school ideals or childhood longings would eventually fade as I stepped into the ‘real world’. Most people I think do lose this insatiable desire. But for those that keep dreaming, for those that keeping hoping and still see life full of possibilities – it’s even more encouraging to me. For that reason, it’s always been very encouraging whenever I’ve meet someone older that myself that truly has a dream, no matter how big or small. Although I’m not sure I have my dream motorcycle trip yet, this encourages me not to be afraid to find it.
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