Unofficial Travels

The view from Bhutan, complete with Buddhist prayer flags

If you have forgotten, having not seen me in a long time, I have blue eyes, dirty-dishwater brown hair (which is currently red, thanks to henna), and light beige skin (so says the make-up I use). I am hardly one of those people who could be from anywhere, and yet many times in several different Asian countries, I have been told that I could pass for a local—Egypt, Syria, India, China (OK, just kidding about the last one, although I was mistaken for a Chinese person on the phone a few times, which was very flattering. Chinese people were more impressed by the differences in my appearance—my protruding nose, the three folds in my eyelids. Apparently, that’s a sign of beauty, but to me it means that I’m probably going to end up like my grandfather who had surgery a few years ago to remove excess eye-skin that was impeding his vision.).  In the Middle East, it wasn’t too much of a stretch for me to be a local. As Joanna used to point out, there’s a lot of Crusader blood mixed in there…but when I was told I could pass as a light-skinned Indian, I admit that I was a bit skeptical. 

My hand is in Bhutan

It started a few weeks ago when I was planning a trip to the Bhutan border area for work. I knew the partners I was going to visit are well-connected in the area, and I thought, “Why not ask if they could get me in to Bhutan for a day?” Those of you unfamiliar with the Bhutanese immigration policies may not know why that is a big deal. Last time I was in the area, a mean-looking lady refused to let me even set one foot across the border into her homeland, since foreign tourists (i.e. not Indians) must have very expensive permission to enter. In protest, I stuck my hand through the fence and took a picture. Why did I not just get the permission to enter? Because I am not that rich. To go to Bhutan, an American tourist (and I believe it is the same for other Western nationalities as well) must pay $220 per day and stay at least 7 days. That equals $1540 (I think) and I don’t have that kind of money or 7 free days, for that matter.  But I had heard rumors that there was a way to get one-day permission to enter. So I asked the partners, and they, being SOOO happy that I was finally coming to visit again, agreed to arrange the permission for me. I brought along my passport and extra passport photos in order to be prepared for whatever information they might need from me. OK, fine, I always bring my passport with me whenever I travel, and I always keep extra passport photos in my wallet. Yes, some of them were taken almost 10 years ago, but that’s the benefit of never growing up—I still look mostly the same.

After completing my work in the area (and that was awesome, too bad I don’t have time to tell you about that here), we drove to the border town of Jaigaon. Jaigaon is technically a part of Bhutan, but the Indian government is renting it from them. I’m not sure why they want to do that, but maybe that is easier than building another entry gate into the country, since the British already messed up the boundary there a while ago. Still, I don’t count it as being in Bhutan because I didn’t officially go through the gate. I did buy oleh-olehs for the niece and nephews though, and I will count those as being from Bhutan, especially since I got back some Bhutanese money as change.

With my bodyguards

We stayed in Jaigaon overnight, waiting for the government official friend of the partners to arrive. We met the next morning at breakfast. He asked me about my passport and visa, we hopped in the car and headed to the Indian immigration office where I handed over my passport. At this point I still thought that my passport would be involved in getting me in the country, but I was wrong. My passport would not be going with me to Bhutan. When I found out, I felt a bit disloyal leaving it behind—my passport and I are great friends, and we go everywhere together. I also kind of wanted a Bhutanese stamp, but not enough to pay more than one thousand dollars for it.

As we drove up to the gate, the Indian immigration official riding in the front seat of the fancy government SUV we were in, turned around and said to me, “Don’t tell anyone you are from America.”

I said, “OK, but won’t they figure that out when they see my passport?”

He said, “Your passport is back at the immigration office. They won’t see it. Also, speak only in Hindi.”

That’s when I realized that the success of our plan was based on tinted car windows and my Hindi ability. Also powerful Indian government officials who assured me that Bhutan can’t really get mad at them because everything in Bhutan comes from India, including their religion (which originated in Bihar, fyi).

I did it! Walking on Bhutanese soil!

So we casually drove through the border, not even bothering to stop for the Bhutanese soldiers, and it was completely no big deal at all. We drove through the little town of Phuentsholing where there were actually quite a few foreign tourists wandering around. The partner with me mentioned that they didn’t look too happy, and I’m pretty sure they were thinking about their rapidly dwindling bank accounts back in their home countries. Meanwhile, I hopped in for free, escorted by an immigration official, an Indian government representative, and his two bodyguards. We drove up the mountains to a famous Buddhist temple next door to one of the queen’s palaces.

We wandered around a bit, and I had just posted a ‘success’ photo on Facebook when the immigration guy turned to me and said, “Oh yeah, don’t tell anyone about this for two days.” I’m not sure why, but I deleted it, in case any of my Facebook friends are Bhutanese officials in disguise. And then I waited two days to write this…also I may have waited two days because I’ve been traveling and I’m tired and I didn’t feel like writing…

While Bhutan and India share a border, these two notices found in Bhutan in the language of the people they were directed at, speak to vast cultural differences between the two neighbors:

In Dzongkha (Bhutanese language), people are warned about releasing pigeons...compare to the sign below written in Hindi:

Here people are warned not to "urine or toilet" around the monastery...and my Hindi is particularly good in the area of toilets, so I know that the Bhutanese writers spelt "urine" wrong in  Hindi.

Bhutanese man spins the prayer wheel 

Going up the mountain 

All too soon it was time to go. We piled back into our fancy SUV, which is so fancy it talks to you and gives advice like “the car is starting now. For your safety, it is recommended that you fasten your seatbelt.” But of course, much like we ignored Bhutanese immigration law, we all ignored the car’s advice as well.   Then the Indian government official ignored us when we told him that we could only take a quick side trip to a project site he wanted to show me, and he took us on a journey that involved a 30 minute drive to and from, plus a 45 minute hike up and down a mountain and three 30 minute meetings with a large number of people we didn’t know at all and several tea breaks. It was OK, though, because I got to hike up a mountain on the Bhutanese border with some heavily armed Indian soldiers.

So the moral of the story could be “Never give up on your dreams” or maybe ‘Where there’s a will, there’s a way” or “Don’t Be Afraid to Use Your Wasta (an Arabic word meaning something like ‘having good high-up connections in government/business/relationships/etc that can get you want you want with minimal trouble to yourself).” Those are all great mottos for all of you, but for me it’s probably “Go to as many countries as you can, as cheaply as possible.” Also, Bhutan has a really cool flag with a dragon on it, and I've always wanted to go there.

Bhutanese schoolgirl, in uniform, admiring the view while waiting for her bus

From the Library of Amanda Stillman

Northern Sudanese me

Anytime you look at someone’s library, you learn something about who they are. Whenever I’m at someone’s house or office, I look at their bookshelves. It’s always interesting to me.  My family is pretty bookish, and we all have some sort of book collection.  Joanna and Benji’s library is full of books about parenting and being godly people and getting the Gospel out into the world. Marian and Josh’s library is full of military books, young adult fantasy, anything by L.M. Montgomery, Laura Ingalls Wilder, or a plethora of other sophisticated female writers, and of course, parenting books, and books about being godly people. Marian and Josh have a ridiculously large library filled with a variety of books (some stolen from good people who happen to live out of the country and some borrowed from that same good person, but many purchased legitimately). You can tell things about their lives and personalities from their books. Joanna and Benji have a small library since they

Sudanese sisters in Yemen!

don’t have a lot of room to keep lots of books, and they care about being parents and being godly people. Marian and Josh have posh military housing, so they have lots of books, and they care about being good parents and being godly people and knowing about the military. Also, Marian just loves books. As for me, surprisingly, I own no parenting books. My books about being godly are all on my kindle because you can often get those books for free online, and I am always looking for discounted godliness. The few that I do have actual copies of were given to me by my concerned parents. My mom once gave me the same book two years in a row at Christmas because she’s getting old and so is her memory. It worked out well, though, because I hadn’t read it the first time, and I did read it the second time. And it was actually a good book.

Some of my early Sudanese friends

I was thinking about this because I just bought a new language book. When I committed to buying it—clicking the ‘confirm’ button on Amazon, I realized something: I committed to buying this book because I’ve accepted that I’m moving to this new country. It is not unusual for me to be looking at language books. The Foreign Language Section is my favorite of any bookstore. I can spend hours checking out obscure dictionaries, phrase books, and grammar texts for various languages that I’ll probably never take the time to learn—from Xhosa to Khmer to Quechua or Kurdish. I am just fascinated by the sounds and letters and meanings.  But I rarely buy them, for the same reason that I rarely buy anything: I never have enough room in my life for more stuff beyond the essentials. I really hate having stuff—I love getting rid of excess crap I’ve accumulated, but books are an exception. So if I buy a book, I have to really like it. Or I would have to be enrolled in a class that required it.  But I’m done with school now, hopefully forever, so the books I buy have to be useful to me. The books that I keep now are all re-readers for me. So there are a few books by a Canadian author dear to my heart—Gordon Korman. I was taught by Canadians until grade 6 (see how I did that, eh?), and they shaped my young reading interests. Gordon Korman makes me laugh, and I love laughing. His book about kids who hate camp and try to escape is written for junior high boys, and I love it so much I have it memorized. And I still read it again every time I’m back with it.  And then there are books about relief and development, which is my chosen field, and occasionally I want to go back and get ideas and refresh my memory on certain concepts.  But the largest category of books in my small library are the language books. If you look through those books, you can see a bit of my story—where I’ve been, the people I’ve met and loved, the languages and cultures that have shaped my own thoughts and ideas, the millions of words crowded in my mind that I’m constantly translating from the word that BEST fits to the word that the person I’m speaking with will actually understand. I don’t speak all of those languages fluently, but I can at least carry on a basic conversation in all of them. And I’ve known and cared about someone who speaks each of those languages. If I haven’t been to a homeland of that language, at least I plan to go someday (Yes, I’m talking about you, Afghanistan and/or Iran).

Indian babies=I like them

So the book I just bought is a Juba-Arabic phrase book. It is scheduled to arrive at Joanna and Benji’s house about a month or so before I make my next move to the next country that will be my home for however long the Lord allows. I’ve loved Sudanese people from my college days when I worked with precious refugee kids from there. Then I lived with a lovely Northern Sudanese lady for a year in Yemen, even celebrating a big holiday with her family. I’ve never lived in Africa before, though I’ve traveled there. I’m looking forward to spending time in a place I already feel connected to.  I’m glad I’m not saying goodbye to India forever, though. I’ll be back and forth for the rest of this year at least. It’s a new transition for me, but I’m pretty good at transitions. I’m good at change and moving on and trying new things, but I’m bad at goodbyes. I always have the urge to sneak away without telling anyone. I never do that, but I always wish I could. I don’t like to make people sad. I know how much it hurts to be left behind. It is really hard to balance the goodbyes between all the friends from different places.  I know I’ll be eating 5 or 6 dinners every day for that last week….it’s fun at first, but it gets challenging towards the end. I hate those prolonged goodbyes—come back to my house one more time, eat dinner with us for the last time, one more time, one last time…That mantra will be going through my head too. Last time to watch for mongooses while I run…last time to sleep in this bed, cook in this kitchen, shop at this store, pay my electricity bill at the ATM…

Sudanese babies=I like them (I was so young and innocent!)

I’m excited about what’s next—new people, new challenges, new adventures, but I know that it will inevitably be followed by another goodbye and ‘last time for____’.  They say home is where the heart is, and I’ve left pieces of my heart all over the world. Ripping off chunks of your heart and throwing them around is pretty painful, but I’ve certainly made myself a lot of wonderful homes all over the place. I’m not complaining. Most people don’t get much say in their occupation. I did get to choose mine, and I’m acutely aware of what a blessing that is. I know not as many people are as jealous of my life as I think they should be, but I’m thankful for my calling and how much I love doing what I do, even though so often it just hurts. Mostly I’m thankful for the hope that I have that everything is going to be renewed. There will be a new Earth, without pain and sorrow and poverty and evil. And I’m pretty sure that all the people and places and cultures and languages I know and love will be right there with me, perfected in the way He always intended that they would be. I will be out of a job then, of course, so I’ll get to devote myself to lots of new hobbies, like developing my superpowers of flying and teleportation, or maybe joining some new and exciting profession like marine archaeology or sky-diving ballet (it’s not a thing yet, but it will be).

Drawing diagrams of toilets in the dirt--every little girl's dream job! Don't worry, India: this project isn't finished yet. I'll be back! (Probably 3-4 more times this year...)

Thoughts on Indian Air Travel

As I sit here in the church guest house in Ranchi, being chewed on by mosquitos, it occurred to me that I haven’t updated the blog in a while. No, this is not surprising, and as usual, I have a million excuses, some of which are actually good. For example: I’m about to move again for the third time in a year, I am doing 2 jobs in addition to the one I signed up for when I came to India, I had to go on a visa-extending trip to Sri Lanka, my internet is not excellent. Some bad excuses may include the following: I don’t feel like being productive when I don’t have to be, my job is really stressful right now and occasionally depressing and no one wants to hear about that, I have too many interesting things popping into my mind and I can’t choose which one to write about, Marian’s blog/s are really good and entertaining and uplifting, so that niche is filled. Also she has cute photos of her kids and, basically, that’s all she needs for a successful blog. Joanna: you should take that into account too. Just pop some more photos of your babies up and voila—you have a blog.

But recently I have had some recurring insights into life in India quirks.  I thought I would share because they amuse me as a foreigner, but no one else here shares that amusement, since I don’t really hang out with foreigners here. Since I have spent the vast majority of my life these past few months traveling, most of my insights are travel-related.  I’m beginning to think that my nephew’s assumption that I live in the airport is not far wrong…

Today as I strode confidently into the airport in Kolkata, I swerved around wide-eyed tourists and chubby old ladies in saris and staked my claim on my space in line to make sure that none of those aforementioned ladies could butt in front of me. It is always the chubby sari-clad ladies who act all innocent like they just want to get close to the sign to see where they are supposed to go and then they will go back to the end of the line. Do not be fooled! Once they’ve wedged themselves in front of you, they won’t go back and then they will take an extra-long time doing whatever you were waiting in line to do because this is the first time in an airport and they have no idea what they are doing. And then when I realize this, it somehow endears them to me again and I forget how annoyed I was before as I kindly show them how to put their bags on the conveyor belt to be scanned…I am an angel…so full of patience…

And speaking of these scanners, Kolkata airport security is very concerned about electric items that might be in your carry-on. Everything that can be connected to an electrical outlet must be removed from the bag. Today, after removing my laptop as I always do, I was stopped and instructed to remove every other electronic item from my bag so that they could re-scan the bag. As a true member of the 21^st century, I had to remove my phone, my kindle, my Zune (OK, I’m not that far in the 21^st century because I got a Zune instead of an ipod, but I mostly did that because I am the middle-child and I have spent my life searching for uniqueness), and an external hard drive. I was then questioned again to make sure that I had NOTHING else with an electric current in it. I showed them the cord to my laptop and they said, “It is electric.” I said, “Not unless it’s plugged into an outlet.” But they ignored me. They proceeded to scan the bag again without the dangerous items. But they didn’t rescan the items themselves. It reminded me of a childhood moment in the Jakarta airport when an over-zealous security guard insisted on looking in my checked suitcase again. He was very concerned about my hairdryer. He looked it over, questioned its use (I also question it—I only use them in the winter to make sure that my hair doesn’t turn into icicles and break off or if I want to make myself feel like I am putting effort into my appearance), and then informed me that I was not allowed to use it on the flight.  Often I have issues with authority and/or people telling me what to do, but in this case I was perfectly willing to acquiesce to his command—since it was in my checked luggage anyway and I have yet to find a way to wash my hair on board an airplane.

Though India and Indonesia may be overly concerned about electronics in bags, India, at least, is very unconcerned about liquids. I could walk through the metal detector with a Big Gulp soda in one hand, and no big deal (that is a thing, right? I was raised in Asia but I feel like I have heard about Big Gulp drinks and I feel like they should be a some kind of testimony to American obesity which we hear about all the time, though let me tell you, I have seen plenty of Indians who have eaten enough chapatis to fill out their saris and sarwals in creative ways)…It is also nice not to have to worry about travel-sized shampoo and toothpaste or nitroglycerin or whatever.

But don’t let India’s lack of concern for the prevention of liquid explosives on airplanes make you think that they aren’t focused on safety and security and being aware of all that is going on around them. Airports are one of the few places where I watch Indian news on tv (since I don’t have a working one in my current house) and I’ve noticed that Indian news is ALWAYS breaking news. I mean, I have yet to see a program that doesn’t have “BREAKING NEWS” scrolling across the top or bottom of the screen (top or bottom of the screen is left to the creativity of the news team, but breaking news is not an option-everything is breaking news). Maybe I’m just not watching tv enough, but I did mention that I spend a lot of time in airports. What is the likelihood that every time I look at the screen it is breaking news and every time I’m not looking at it, it is not? I’m not so great with probabilities, but I’m thinking it’s kind of low.   It does kind of freak me out. I’ve been conditioned to believe that “BREAKING NEWS” signifies some dire event—a huge storm coming my way, an act of terrorism that could/will lead to war in some country that I have probably lived in, an escaped convict on the loose in my neighborhood, the latest contestant to be kicked off American Idol—you know, the BIG things. So I glance up to see “BREAKING NEWS” and I’m thinking, “Crap, I hope my flight doesn’t get canceled.” And then I notice that it’s just some political rally in some random state about some random politician that said something about a food shortage or Hinduism or whatever. No one besides said random politician and enthusiastic nearby onlookers with nothing else to do will be immediately affected. But, I’ve got to hand it to the Indian news media: they make you want to watch the rally for about 10 seconds (9 seconds more than I would have watched if it hadn’t been “BREAKING NEWS”).

My final thought on Indian air travel (I know you’re so excited that I’ve almost finished this lengthy treatise on my life in Indian airports) is regarding an issue that used to bug the crap out of me before I learned to prepare myself for it. It is the showing of the boarding pass to a random otherwise-unemployed person as I get OFF the plane. Yes, I said get OFF. “Why?” you ask. I don’t know. I have been asking myself this same question. Here are several theories:

1.     They want to make sure that I am getting off at the right stop. But if not, will they put me back on the plane until I get to my intended destination?

2.     They want to make sure I wasn’t stowing away in the bathroom the whole time or clinging to the wing, hitching an illegal ride.

3.     They want to make sure that I didn’t switch tickets with someone on the plane during the flight which could result in…some kind of shenanigans?

4.     They want to employ that otherwise unemployed person who is checking my ticket.

Seriously, if anyone on Earth has any idea why they do this, let me know. If they have a good reason, it would greatly help my peace of mind when I get off the plane and have to dig around in my bag, trying to remember where the hell I stuffed that ticket in the mad rush to find my seat and sit in it before I get smacked in the face by someone rushing to get his bag into the overhead compartment. Now that I am prepared for this ridiculous and (in my view) completely unnecessary inspection, I keep the ticket tucked in my kindle or passport for easy access and I swing by the uninformed foreigners digging through their bags with a smug knowing smile.  I wish I could keep it in my pocket, but as I mentioned previously, Indian clothes for women do not have pockets, and the ticket is too big to fit in my bra. Or my bra is too small for the ticket…either way, not an option.

So here I am in Ranchi for a day. I’m back to Kolkata tomorrow, on to Patna on Wednesday, back to Ranchi next week, then back to Patna, then on to Bagdogra, then back to Patna, then to Meghalaya, the back to Patna, and then a ridiculously long flight to the US of A, whereupon landing I do not have to re-show my ticket.

Yes, that is a lot of traveling, but the good news is that JetAirways has a new November magazine out which I can now memorize, since I already finished memorizing the October one…There is never a dull moment in my life…

Merry Christmas and a Happy Sylvester

If you haven't heard this story already (so not Emily, Joanna, Marian, my parents, Scott, Ashley, is there anyone else who even reads this?), you may be a bit confused by the title. The first time I heard this traditional English greeting, I was also slightly unsure of it's exact meaning. I was quickly enlightened by my landlord, who loves to tell me new words in the English language that no one who actually speaks English has ever heard of. Apparently, in some places (maybe a remote South Pacific Island formerly colonized by the British...I haven't been able to to confirm this yet, but I'm working on it), "sylvester" is another way to refer to the New Year. We asked a British girl if it was some random British thing, like sardines on toast or spelling "color" with a 'u,' but she said it wasn't. At least it was a way of breaking up our traditional conversation that we have every time my landlord actually shows up to collect the rent (he was supposed to come tonight and didn't show). Every time he comes, he reminds me of the time that the French UNIFIL guys left for vacation and didn't shut the water valves. He got a call at 4.00am telling him that there was water flowing over the balcony of his apartment. When they got back from their vacation and saw the damage, all they could say was "Mr. Abbas, you told us. And you were right. And now we will pay for everything because you were right. If only we had listened to you and shut off the water valves." And so you see, Miss Amanda, you must close the water when you leave the house! Also, give me more money because you use too much electricity.

Mr. Abbas isn't the only Arab man who has helped me learn more about my language. One of my friends in Jordan had a father who was a lawyer and also an expert in every language in the world. Of course, as he informed me, all languages are derived from Arabic. He took my raised eyebrows as a sign of my interest and continued. "For example, your word "genie" comes from our word 'jinn'." I nodded. This is true. Of course, considering the fact that we don't actually talk about genies on a daily basis and that they generally only come up in conversations involving Arabian Nights or Scheherezade, this wasn't exactly an earth-shattering revelation. But Abu Mohammad was not finished yet. "Your word 'good' comes from the Arabic word 'jayid' which is sometimes pronounced 'gayid' and therefore 'good'." I murmured something about the German word 'gut,' but he ignored me and began to clear up another commonly misconception. "Your word 'technology' comes from the Arabic word 'teknolojia'." So you see why everyone needs to learn Arabic. It's the only way to honestly be able to communicate what you truly feel. Or so Abu Mohammad told me...

So that’s your little language lesson from me and my linguist friends. I hope you all have a happy Christmas and a wonderful Sylvester. I also hope you have some great friends who will give you exciting presents like some of the ones I have received- Guccirash perfume and a shiny porcelain picture frame with a dolphin on a spring leaping in front of the photo that will be inserted there someday. Enjoy your fake or real trees as I enjoy the dead one I spray-painted silver. And have fun with your families as I am enjoying mine…see you in 20 minutes, Emily, with the dressing, the rolls, the chocolate mint dessert and the marshmallows for your sweet potatoes. Bejewelled or Family Band tonight?

This is my Christmas photo with my tree and the Fuzz.