First update from India: camels, monkeys, and car horns

I’ve arrived in Jaipur (the pink city) and just an hour ago met my host family. They’re very nice. The husband is a doctor and the wife is a professor. I have an adorable little room at the front of the house with its own separate entryway. They also have internet access, so hopefully my updates will become more frequent! Anyway, it’s on a cute and thankfully quiet street. Most streets here are not quiet. Indians don’t seem to use turn signals, traffic lights, or traffic laws. Instead they honk their horns with vigor, just to let other cars know they are there, which makes for a mightly loud city! As you might imagine the streets are extremely chaotic, with cars, buses, motorcycles, cycle rickshaws, autorickshaws, people, camels, pigs, goats, sheep, cows, and dogs all vying for a place. I have never seen such chaos. I have also never seen chaos function so well. Somehow they all know how to avoid hitting each other (thus far) and traffic generally keeps flowing. The only law that is generally followed is “drive on the left” but even that is frequently disobeyed. It’s also not unusual to have traffic stopped by a truck that is sitting in the middle of the road, jacked up so that it can be repaired.

The people here are very nice, and most are shocked that we Americans speak Hindi. Speaking Hindi makes people much more excited to help us, it seems, though everyone is generally nice to begin with. of course there will always be tricksters and people out to get your money, but in general, people seem good-spirited. It is, however, a bit exhausting being a woman. The calls of “Hey madam!” or “Allo! Allo!” are constant, and any acknowledgment of them only increases their intensity. So when walking down the street the women just ignore them, which is kind of…tiring.

So, it may not be “home sweet home,” but it’s tolerable so far. The chaos is endearing at times and maddening at times. People routinely park all over the sidewalk, as there is no parking on the street. In fact the street kind of blends into the sidewalks. The smells are, of course, intense, and range from delectable (Indian food! Spices! Incense!) to nauseating (open sewers! Rotten garbage! Cow poop!). And cows really do roam freely, which is startling at first but you kind of get used to it.

Also, I saw monkeys! And camels! And an elephant! And a camel train! And this was all on the “highway” from Delhi to Jaipur. There are a lot of camels here, as we’re in the desert (sort of). The monsoon came early this year, so it rains almost every day, which makes for a bit of a mess in the streets. Despite the rain, it’s hot here. I’m sure, because my alarm clock tells the temperature and 75 or 80 degrees feels like a relief.