Year in Review

Namaste,

I started my year in India on July 10th 2008, I was not aware of the culture and customs of India at the time. Over the next 11 months I had the opportunity to learn so much about India and myself.

Within a month I had already started yoga and Hindi language classes thanks to the help I received from my host families. I continued yoga every weekday morning for 4 months and attended an extra program for kreas (cleansing techniques) where I was able to put a rubber tube in my nose and out my mouth. I learned a lot about yoga in the 4 months that I took it every weekday morning but I learned even more about yoga when I took, and successfully completed, the one month yoga teachers training course at the Yoga Institute. During which I had to do 6 hours of yoga based classes every weekday. That took up most of my time in March.

I took Hindi classes for about two months at the beginning of the year then for a couple weeks at the beginning of April. I was able to ask questions, give directions, bargain and sometimes I was able to follow what people were talking about if it was basic. People were often impressed by how much I understood. I am also able to read the Devnagari script at a very slow pace.

I have also done a lot of volunteer work, for example I worked for approximately 2 months (once or twice a week) at Akanksha (a NGO for slum children) I was helping them with reading English and understanding maths. I was also a member of the Rotaract Club of Mumbai Shivaji Park, so I attended 4 projects and one meeting, one to aid seniors in a shelter, one to raise transgender awareness, one to play with kids of parents who have HIV and one to celebrate Diwali with mentally challenged kids. I also attended the Rotaract District Conference and maintained some friendships with the Rotaracters of my club. I also volunteered at an orphanage in Bandra East that is affiliated with the Yoga Institute, playing with the kids.

I also did dance training like all the other exchange students in January and Performed at the District Conference.

One of the most revealing things I did this year was Vipassana. Thanks to the help of my host family I was able to do the 10 day Vipassana meditation course. I did the course in the middle of April. I learned a lot about myself (for example my life plan) and how to approach life as well as gaining more self confidence and self awareness. I now approach problems more objectively and with a balanced mind. As I said I learned many lessons that I will now apply throughout my life, I am very glad that I completed the course and hope others follow in my path.

I spoke on two occasions at my Rotary club once for 5 minutes and the other I was the main speaker; I spoke mostly about Canada and myself. I also maintained a very good relationship with Rotarians of my club and was always happy when I saw one walking around Shivaji Park in the evening.

I made a few Indian friends that I have enjoyed spending time with, most of whom were my host brothers friends but one from college I am still in contact with. I have also maintained excellent relationships with all three of my host families, I have not had any problems with them and they have not had any problems with me.

I have attended 2 weddings and funeral rituals for my second host grandmother.

I like all the other students went on all three trips, my favourite parts were the desert near Jaisalmer, the Taj Mahal, river rafting on the Ganges, the tea fields of Munnar, Kanyakumari, the Kerala backwaters and the Himalayas. I think the Himalaya trip was my favourite.

I am sure there are thing which I have forgotten to mention but I think this is just about my year in a nutshell.



I have learned so much about India and myself during these 11 months along with making lifelong friends, learning about a new culture, seeing much of India, and living my dream. I am excited yet depressed to go home but I will surely pass along the message of an emerging India as well as how much I enjoyed my stay here to my Canadian compatriots.

I will be writing to show how Canada has changed for me and how reverse culture shock affects me.

Finally, I would like to thank all my host families (Anil Rao, Girish Karandikar, and Sunil Surkund), my host and sponsor Rotary clubs, you two, and anyone else who made my dreams some true during this year.

Dhanyavaad

-Allen Fowlis

Himalaya

Hello pictures are of a mountain view from near our hotel, the view from our base camp, jumping off the rocks at the highest point we reached, me at the top with the Canadian flag, and finally the point of skiing you can see how people wore skisuits from the 70’s and skied on flat ground with other pushing them.
Ok so now I have officially procrastinated too much. Sorry everyone, mom in particular because I know you are anxious to read this blog.
This blog will be about my trip to the Himalayas, a switch of families (twice) and recent times. First of all let me get started on the Himalaya trip. Starting on April 24th 12 of us exchange students went by train to Delhi then by overnight bus to Manali. Let me tell you about something that happened two days before the trip though. For one month all the exchange students were under the impression that Simon (an exchange student from France) was leaving on the 23rd of April. He told us that he was leaving like a month before the date and we didn’t believe him at that time because sometimes he can be full of BS, if you catch my drift. Anyway he kept the prank going on till April 22nd and everyone believed him at that time so it came as a complete shock that he was to be coming on the trip. To keep the prank believable he even bought gifts for his family and showed them to us. I was so suspicious before the 10 days of silence (Vipassana) but after I believed him. He then told us all on the terrace of his building everyone was so shocked.
So the train and bus journeys were really boring. You think they will be cool because we are all together but everyone is sick of each other after about 5 hours and the train is 15 hours then the bus is 15 hours also. Both were overnight journeys so 2 nights of terrible sleep. We arrived in Delhi in the morning then relaxed in a hotel till we left for Manali in the evening. The bus ride was really terrible, the first 5 hours were ok but then after that the road quality went downhill as the road went uphill, and the road was winding like there is no tomorrow. I slept a grand total of about 2 hours on that bus. The seats were nice but I found myself restlessly flipping through the magazines my mom had sent for almost the entirety of the trip. One slightly funny thing happened on the bus ride; while I was trying to sleep the bus was moving so much so the magazines which were on the ground slid all the way to the front of the bus along with my fake Ray Ban sunglasses, so after the 5am tea break the driver walked down the aisle holding two things that were lost on the bus ride both of which were mine. Also on the bus there was a lady who was very motion sick so she was vomiting from 2am till the end of the ride, I felt bad for her but as for the Brazilians (from our group) who were sitting in front of her I laughed at them. We reached Manali in the morning. Manali is a pretty nice place; although it is commercial we immediately took a bus 10km to a valley where our hotel was. On the first day we did a few acclimatization walks because we just came from sea level to the tallest mountain range in the world. I thought there would be more wildlife around in this area but there were only really horses, cows, birds, and lizards from what I could see.
I thought it would be just us exchange students on the trip but we were sharing the hotel and the trek with Indian families, and Indian teens in total there were probably 30 of us and only 12 IYE students. This was actually very cool because the people were very nice and interested in our exchange. If I was ever tired of spending time with the other exchange students I could always go and talk with the Indian teens or families. I met one Indian guy who supported the same English soccer club and same tennis player as me so I talked with him a bunch. Since the trip even I have met up with him because he also lives in Mumbai, like most of the people who were on the trek.
The next day we still did some more acclimatization but of a different type. First we went for a walk up a valley to see a Shiva temple which was built under a waterfall, so the gods were constantly being bathed by the water. That was really interesting and really cold on the feet. One great thing about the Himalayas was how cool (weather wise) it was up there. Ever since coming to India I have not really experienced cold temperatures but I finally got that in the Himalayas. I was able to think clearly with the cold air in my nose but I wasn’t thinking clearly enough to put on sunscreen during the second day. At such an altitude the sunlight intensifies so although the atmosphere was cool I was being bunt to a crisp. After the temple under the waterfall we did a session of rappelling but we just did it off a very small cliff so it was no biggie. Around the place where we did rappelling there were lots of these really crazy lizards so naturally I tried to catch them very unsuccessfully. We then came back for some lunch and rest. In the afternoon till evening we did a walk to another waterfall and just observed it. On the walk back we went through a village, it was so amazing to see how humble of lives these people lived and their clothing style was so different from anything I have seen.
The next day the trek started. We first walked 8km up a river valley to our base camp. It was really cool what services they could provide for us at such an altitude, I guess with money anything is possible. The walk took from morning till afternoon and then we had time to explore around the campsite and have lunch. In the late afternoon we did another walk to a higher altitude and played some Frisbee up there. There was a military base and avalanche research centre just up the hill from our base camp so we often saw military personal around the place. One of the military guys was a sikh guy and he had an amazing beard, it was so thick and full I had no hope of seeing his chin and furthermore I started to wonder how many families of birds could nest in there. In the night we slept in tents, and many people (especially the Brazilians) were struggling with the cold. I loved the cold weather although next winter I will probably miss the Indian weather. The next morning I woke up early, way too early, and watched the first sunrays hit the enormous, rocky, pointed, surreal, mountains while freezing my body in the process, gotta love life!
On this morning we started the trek up to the highest point. We walked for about 4 km up through the snow to the highest point we would reach. It was about 11,000 feet or something (like 3500m). The greatest thing was finally feeling snow again although it was dirty and hard I still loved the feel of snow on my feet and in my hands, when I was throwing snowballs at people. I am sure next winter I will be cursing the snow and cold but for these 3 hours I loved it. We even found some rocks and jumped off them for some action shots. Also a really cool thing was that there were some dogs that were like street dogs, they had no host family or anything, but they didn’t live on the streets they lived in the mountains, so they were mountain dogs. Anyhow these dogs were incredibly friendly and clean so all the exchange students were naming them and playing with them. There were also two dogs that followed us all the way up to the highest part of the trek they just ran along with the group always within sight of us, they stopped when we did and generally just had a gay old time. They didn’t even beg for food they just enjoyed spending time with us.
We slid down the mountain from the highest point on our butt’s and coming down took less than a third of the time to come up and it was really fun sliding down the Himalayas on my butt. I got really wet and cold but it was so memorable. We had a camp fire that night sans the marshmallows but it was still great. Also when we came down from the trek there was a movie being shot there from south India, it was like Bollywood but not quite the same degree, this was really cool to see.
I think the most amazing aspect of the trip was just the realization of where you are. You just look up and see these rocky peaks towering over you and the humble people who live in the presence of such monsters and you realize how good life really is. Every time I looked up I would be so overwhelmed and speechless I was just relishing every moment. I had to keep telling myself that you are at the base of the tallest and one of the most holy mountain ranges in the world. The whole experience of being there was so surreal in addition to feeling so different from the rest of India. The rest of India is very busy, sometimes smelly, and pretty chaotic but in contrast the Himalayas were very peaceful, clean, and relaxing. You just feel so right walking in this area.
If you want to read the rest tomorrow feel free!
So after we walked down from the trek we relaxed for the day and played some pretty good pranks that I won’t go into unless you are interested, in that case email me. The next day we went to Rothang that is a point of interest because it is the second highest road which you can drive on in the world. At a point up there people did skiing, although I didn’t it was really fun to teach the Indian people I met on this trip how to ski. The reason why I didn’t ski was because it was a terrible location to ski as the ground was flat and there was minimal snow. There was no lift at all and to get up the hill people were pushed by their friends or just struggled their way up, I pushed my fair share of people up the hill. The view from this road was amazing, the deepness of the valley, the cliffs, the peaks and a waterfall. In the afternoon we went to Manali. As I told you we stayed about 15km away from the main town site of Manali and this afternoon we went to the main place and did a bunch of shopping. I bought shawls, a woolen jacket, some yak wool socks, and some posters made of cloth. We were back in the evening for our last night in the Himalayas. The next day we went to Manali in the morning and did more shopping and then caught the bus for Delhi in the late afternoon. After the overnight bus ride and an overnight train ride to Mumbai I got home in the morning and relaxed throughout the day and packed my bags. In the evening it felt so good to finally sleep in my own bed.
The next day I moved to a new host family. My new host family is really very good. They have two kids age 21 and 18 and they are really great. Although they study like 12 hours a day they can still find time to entertain us, meaning Jens and me. Jens is a German guy who is hosted by the same Rotary club and so we both moved into the house at the same time. The family is members at a sports club, so I often went there to swim or jog. I also went there to watch the final of the IPL cricket league. This is like the professional players from every country coming together and playing for Indian city teams like the NHL but for cricket. Unfortunately I didn’t get to see any live IPL matches because the league was moved to South Africa this year for security reasons. The federal election was going on at the same time so the country couldn’t handle to secure both the election and the cricket. The country is relatively stable although there are threats sometimes. For example Delhi and Mumbai were under threat during election time but nothing happened. The one terrorist survivor of the November terrorist attacks on Mumbai is still being charged, I read in the paper the lawyer appointed to defend him was given a 2 week recess to read the 11,000 page charge sheet. Anyway back on track the Deccan Chargers (who play our of Hyderabad) won the IPL. At the sports club they had a promotion on where if you buy two pints of Tiger beer and pick a team then however many boundaries (4’s and 6’s) that team hits you get a free pint of tiger. We came home with 34 pints of tiger for the price of 4. The host family also allows friends to sleep over so I often had friends over. With the kids we went out to Hard Rock café on a Saturday night and for some late night street food another night.
One night I went with a few exchange friends to a music club called ‘Not Just Jazz by the Bay’ and we saw a very good concert there. The bad played a lot of ABBA and other old upbeat tunes.
Oh ya btw, it is Mango season now and you have no idea how choice the mangoes are. I have only really eaten Mexican mangoes I think and not often but thanks to the world famous Alphonso mangoes I now officially have a new favorite fruit, move aside Mr. Apple. At the house we bought a huge crate full of mangoes and I had about 4 mangoes every day. You don’t know how amazing the taste is unless you actually try.
My new host family went to Thailand for 10 days so now I am with the sister of my host mom till June fifth and then I am going back to Canada on June ninth. The family is very nice. They have two kids age 12 and 4, the 4 year old is insane he is really cute but he is loud and feisty. Just the other day at about 8 he came in the room and said WAKE UP, IT IS SUNNY OUTSIDE, I went back to sleep then 2 hours later he yelled in my ear WAKE UP, I smacked him (lightly) with my pillow then got up 10 minutes later. I really like the kids though so it is cool.
You have no idea how fast time goes in the last few days it really just creeps up on you. I have lots of things to do and buy but I am sure it will all get done. I can’t believe my dream bubble will finally be popped 8 days from now when I fly back to Canada. I think, like all exchange students, I am full of conflicting emotions that are really unexplainable to anyone who hasn’t spent a year abroad worked so hard to plant and grow your seeds in another country and then just abandoned everything you have loved.
Please leave comments. I will post once more about my whole years experience before coming back till then hope you are happy wherever you are in the world!