Rural India

For our second day in Chennai, we went on an SAS trip to rural villages of Tamil Nadu, the state in the southeast part of India of which Chennai is the capitol. Our first village is home to a huge temple, which is surrounded by different vendors, including the coconut salesman above and the man who was cooking breakfast bread in a traditional pot.

Several vendors were selling roasted cashews. The temple had beautiful carvings similar to the main temple in Chennai. Surrounding the temple were houses like the one above where Charis is putting on her shoes: these homes are used for worshippers who come from out of town and need a place to stay during special holidays at the temple. (Everyone takes off shoes to go into a home or temple in India.) Many of these houses are associated with particular castes and families return to them generation after generation. The caste system of India is definitely less prevelant than it used to be (by law discrimination is now prohibited), but everyone still knows which caste they come from, and many people from the lower classes, particularly the "untouchables," still face difficulties. Families are still very aware of castes, taking this social structure into account, for example, when children marry. We had a panel on the ship focusing on arranged marriages with students from India and it was interesting to hear their perspectives. Family is very important and many of the Indian students, even those brought up in the states, believe their parents' perspective on their future mate is very important. These days many families use a version of arranged marriage, with the couple able to stop the engagement after a couple weeks of getting to know one another. Most families still use astrologers to check and see if the couple's astrological charts are compatible. Charts that are not compatible are usually a deal-breaker. Some students on the panel said they preferred to find their own mate, but would still never marry anyone not approved of by their parents. Some said they would be okay with an arranged marriage--and none of the students were absolutely against it, noting that their parents knew them better than anyone else and wanted what was best for them. I'm not sure what Charis, Barek and Asher thought of all of this!

This group of women loved meeting the kids and enjoyed getting their picture taken. The men above brought their new John Deere tractor to the temple for blessing: here they place garlands around the front of the tractor.


There were lots of vendors around the temple.

On our way out of the village, we met the women again who were smiling and laughing and excited to see us. They wanted their picture taken again and got so serious for the shot! But then they laughed and laughed again as soon as I snapped the picture. We saw a small Ganesh temple as we left the village.


The next village, where we spent most of the day, was completely delightful! There was a special holiday and so townspeople gathered at the small temple and the children had the day off from school. The man above is tending a field of hot peppers.


The kids loved posing for pictures. At a home in the village, a woman gave us a traditional welcome to her home, including a song and a welcome smudge from the tray above.

The kids from the German family on the SAS program are friends with our kids and here they all pose with our hostess. We went to another home, where they kindly allowed us inside to see what the interior of a village home looks like. We walked through a courtyard where they did the washing.

Out in back, they were cooking the largest kettle of rice ever. The family runs a catering business, and they were getting ready to deliver lunch for 200 to a local company. The men really wanted to pose for a picture with Barek.

Outside, a neighbor was doing metalwork on the side of the street.

At another home, we learned about the art of chalk drawings that families draw on the pavement in front of their doors to welcome visitors. Charis learned that these drawings are more difficult to do than it looks!

Next up was a walk to the outskirts of the village where we walked through a rice field. The boys are walking on a small ridge between rice paddies.

The irrigation system floods certain fields at different hours of the day. The workers demonstrated for us how they plow the watery field and plant the rice seedlings. They used to use water buffalo for the plowing, but are happy now that they use the tractor above. Three of our group took the plunge and tried out planting rice! We all gained a tremendous apprectiation for what it takes to grow and harvest a grain of rice.


We took two ox carts to our next location, a coconut grove, where our host sliced open fresh coconut and we each got our own with a straw to drink. Perhaps it was the amazingly hot and humid day, but today, this coconut juice tasted terrific!

The village kids were wonderful and really loved talking with our kids. Charis gave the girl on the far right a hair ribbon she had, and this girl was ecstatic--but "got serious" for her photo. As we left, the kids followed our ox carts down the road, and I saw the young gal run into her house yelling for her mom with what sounded like, Hey Mom, You'll never guess what happened today!


Charis gave these two girls pink scarves and they were so happy! We all had a blast taking their photos and showing them on our digital cameras. We must have taken a hundred photos of the kids in the village.

Next up, we went to the Dakshinachitra Heritage Village, located near Chenai. We had a terrific south Indian lunch. Who knew that our kids would eat everything set before them? They loved the meal, and we're hoping this continues back home. Charis and I show off our welcome smudges and Mehndi. The heritage village had lots of buildings celebrating different aspects of life in southern India. One room had performing arts displays.

Artists were located throughout the village (kind of like an Indian Conner Prarie Farm for those from Indy) and we saw a woman grind rice into rice flour. Another artist was applying Mehndi, so Barek took the plunge. The weaver above is one of the finest silk weavers in the country. Now retired, he demonstrates his craft at the village. Here he makes a complicated piece of silk that has a different design on each side.

Although the weather was not quite as bad as when Steve and I visited India during summertime (120 degrees!), the summer season has begun in India, and the temperature was in the upper 90s with very high humidity and really strong sun. Sunburnt, tired, dehydrated and filled with rich experiences of village life, we headed home, showered and the kids jumped in the ship's pool. Steve got too much sun and had a bit of a stomach bug, but after a good night's sleep was feeling fit again. We set off through the Bay of Bengal and headed for our next port, Cochin, India.

Here are clips of our welcome to a village home, the chalk drawing, the coconut farmer opening a coconut, and the silk weaver at work: