What language barriers?

After yesterday’s beautiful morning, I decided to wake up early again and I was richly rewarded for my effort with the same tranquility.

There is something about this area I really like. Yes, it is very, very hot and this morning the mosquitoes decided to welcome me, and I still shudder by the thought of black cobras, but all I have to do is look up and see the beauty around me.

Bhuj (and the Panjub area) was nearly completely destroyed in an earthquake in 2001 and they have had to completely rebuild nearly everything. They took the opportunity to develop and progress and Kutch is amazingly forward for an agricultural and rural area. They have rebuild their hospital according to earthquake standards and are focusing heavily on education, something they admit was completely lacking before. Kishore explained that Kutch has experienced 25 years of development in the past 9 years.

It is still a rural area and handicraft is the livelihood of thousands! It is also a heritage they many NGO’s are trying desperately to preserve, but as with so many other cultural heritages, the younger generation has no interest in continuing. So, they have understood that the way to keep it alive is to make it appealing to both the natives and the markets. I sincerely hope they succeed because some of the work I have witnessed (Kutch is famous for their embroidery and tie die) is so incredible, it would be a great loss if it died out.

Today we spent observing the dyeing process in great detail and an amazing thing happened. While we were watching the dyers, I noticed they were slightly apprehensive. This is quite understandable in a culture that is so driven by the fear of losing any status and becoming a nobody. So, the dyers were naturally concerned what these we were going to be reporting especially since the dyeing process has already been a slightly contentious issue. I suddenly noticed the master dyer, Abbush, use sign language with one of the dyers, Ari. When they saw me watching them I quickly explained that my son is deaf and we use sign language with him too. That broke the ice and we suddenly found ourselves in a “conversation” that overcame all language and cultural barriers.

After work, we were invited out to a farm that belongs to one of the managers here. We sat on a wide cot outside and we were shown all the engagement and wedding picture of his oldest son, who got married a few years ago. He has a wonderful family and I learned that in rural India it is customary for the daughter-in-law to spend the last few months of the first pregnancy at the mother-in-laws house until the baby is born. That way she can get the rest and care she needs.

We were given a tour of the house and after seeing the kitchen and one room (semi divided into two smaller), I started wondering if having only one or two rooms for the whole family is more of the custom that an economic necessity. The rest of the house featured a large indoor storage room and a semi-outdoor area that basically was a room with only three walls. Both the storage room and outdoor rooms were much larger than any of indoor rooms and it strikes me again how much this area does not focus on the physical boundaries of life. And yet, in a way they also do. It’s just different, very different.

It seems like the focus of a house is more on the utility, not the excess numbers of bed rooms, dens and guest rooms and they do not divide up as much into separate “my area”s but hang out together. Granted, this is also possible because the weather allows for much more outdoor living. Vasand proudly showed us their outdoor kitchen and he took great pleasure of telling us how wonderful his wife’s cooking is especially when baked over the open wood fire instead of gas burners.

In many ways I wish I could adapt some of their philosophies but I worry I am too selfish. I like peace and quiet to be alone at times and I would struggle with always being inundated with people. I wonder how much living in such a public life affects the values and how they conduct business. It might explain the excessive focus on appearance, not just looks and clothing, but what I would call “photo-op’s”. If someone is popular, he/she is always featured with many people around them. I have seen so many photos of “very important” or “very successful” people and projects and so much seems staged and nearly forced. I am not saying they are not important or successful, but I am talking about the staged presentation and I wonder how that affects people’s behavior and decision making in the long run. If the success of a person or project is measured by how it looks, it could shift focus from long term quality to short term successes. Especially when I paired it with the fear of being a nobody.