VACATION

Oh, man. When was the last time that I took a real vacation? A vacation that was not in any way associated with studying or the like? I dunno, but it's been a long time. But I got a shot at it last week. On Thursday, May 20, I took off for an epic (if limited) tour of the India that I hadn't yet seen - the tourist's India (but, thankfully, not in tourist's season).

Palolem Beach in Goa - the former Portuguese Colony nestled in the India's western coast. Crawling with tourists during the season, but this past week, as the summer days are disappearing and the monsoon is looming? Refreshingly calm, relaxed. Few enough people around that you can really sit and have a conversation with someone you've met - local shopkeepers, waiters, bartenders - all happy to give you the extra attention that's key to a good vacation because well, what else do they have to do?

New Delhi, India's bustling Capital City. It's off season here as well - no wonder, with temperatures topping 45 degrees (that's 113 Fahrenheit, folks). Nonetheless, the city offers up a ton of cool sites to see - national monuments, ancient ruins, suffocating spice markets and delicious food, just to name a few. And, if you're OK with letting go of a little extra cash for air conditioned taxis and hotel rooms, well the heat isn't really that bad. (Did I really say that? I've been in India too long).

Finally, Agra. Just a 2-hour train ride from the capital and home to one of the world's most famous spectacles, the Taj Mahal. For a history/architecture buff, really this is something else. One of the greatest monuments in the world, built by a Mogul king in honor of his beloved wife. Later, the king wanted a similar monument for himself, set just across the river from the Taj, where his wife was buried. But, fearing that he would bankrupt the dynasty, his son overthrew him and imprisoned him in the Agra Fort, a monument in and of itself, where he could keep watch over the Taj from his luxury prison. Cool!

The vacation was totally necessary and was a great balance also. Goa was all about letting loose - getting out all of that pent-up tension that had been building for 5 months in dull, conservative, hot, dusty Hubli. We went from a city where it was scandalous to show even our ankles to a beach of topless tanners. From a city where "nightlife" dies at 10 to a place of 24-hour bars, where whiskey and screwdrivers are an option at breakfast. What happens when 4 Global Exchange Fellows from Deshpande Foundation are let out of the Sandbox together for a Goan weekend? Well, we went a little crazy, naturally. But in a good way. The weekend in and of itself was a refreshment, and for me at least, was absolutely needed.

In fact, if the vacation had been just the hustle, bustle, and power-sightseeing of Delhi and Agra, well, it certainly would not have been a regrettable experience by any means, but I very well might have come back more wiped than I had left. Wake up calls came early and then it was a scramble to see as much as possible - totally worth it, especially when you really only had one day to see each city. Monuments, markets, food stands, restaurants, all of it was brilliant. And it turns out that Agra has even more to offer than just the Taj Mahal (which, by the way, can't be captured in pictures. I've decided that it always looks fake, like a painted backdrop, until you're standing right up underneath it) - besides the other monuments, there are a host of old-school craftsmen around doing stuff that I can go pretty nuts for.

Sidenote: I would not have enjoyed this trip as much had I counted pennies the whole time. After living a relatively modest life in Hubli for 5 months (at least compared to standards developed elsewhere) I was able to justify watching money go down the drain on things like shopping, taxis, drinks, amazing meals. It made it really feel like a vacation just not to think about that stuff, and it was awesome.

All in all, it was a great week filled with great friends and wonderful memories. Glad it happened. I'll wait to post this until I can post with pictures - its worth it.

Oh my God, all my friends are growing up!!!

OK, so due to the time difference and crazy work schedules and EVERYONE having different schedules at different schools, I have not been able to offer individual congratulations to everyone who deserves them these last couple weeks (and for the next month or so, I suppose) but for all of the recent and soon-to-be college graduates out there, CONGRATULATIONS!!!

Also, for all of those who have already nailed down some form of real-world employment for the coming months, I'd like to offer not only my congratulations but my thanks. Thanks SO much for making it clearer to me than ever how little direction I have in my life, and how I do not at all feel ready for the adventure that all of you are so boldly and bravely embarking on.

I'm sure this is an intense time for everyone, and with all the graduation photos and wall posts blowing up my newsfeed on Facebook, I can't help but reminisce about everything that brought you here, the long road that has led up to this point. For Northeastern people, maybe our road together has been a little bit shorter, but still it feels as though it wasn't too long ago that we were sitting in White Hall or Stetson East, and these days seemed worlds away. Crazy how time flies, and crazy how you all accomplished so much in the blink of an eye.

Never mind the people I knew PRE-college, that's even crazier. I remember you guys before drivers licenses, before drinking, when our parents had to drive us to Starbucks for a good time and even a part-time job at Subway or Bob's seemed too big for us. Holy shit how things have changed! Congratulations - you're independent, you're your own person, you've accomplished SO much already and you can be sure that your future holds even bigger things.

Is this blog post cheesy and unnecessary? It might be. But I was taking a Facebook break at work and all of a sudden I was overcome with a sense of pride at everything that my friends have accomplished, and I had to get it down somehow. I'm sorry that I couldn't be there - I would love to be celebrating this with some of you. We'll just have to make up for that soon; make sure you don't forget about me now that you're real-world hotshots!

Anyway, all the best to everyone, and if we haven't talked in a while, drop me a line and let me know what's happening in your life these days, I'd love to hear it. Keep on being amazing!

Love,

Elisha

Oy

Well, for some reason, homesickness has been setting in of late.

Could be many things. If nothing else, we are coming up on 8 months now that I've been living abroad, and while that's been 8 months filled with great people, great experiences, and great new adventures, it's still a long time to be away from the places and people that I truly feel at home with.

But I think there are other things happening too. I was re-admitted to the hospital on Monday, April 12, when the pain I had been dealing with for 2 weeks or so came back full force and then some. I was in the hospital for 3 nights, with a minor surgery on Wednesday to remove the troublesome kidney stone. Being in an Indian hospital, while I was very well taken care of, is definitely an experience that will highlight the differences between here and home. Additionally, it took me out of things for a while - I am only just now in the process of making it back to work.

The surgery was minor - in my opinion, there's no reason for recovery to have taken a full week like it has. Which means, I think, that it finally happened - I burned out. I realized in this time I've had that I was pushing myself so, so hard for something that I didn't even really enjoy anymore. It seemed as though everything was difficult to accomplish. Not just because of the usual frustrating things - lack of cooperation, communication, coordination - but also because of a serious lack of motivation on my part as well. I would work 12 hour days where I felt as though I accomplished nothing. I probably would have noticed earlier that I hated it, but I honestly think I was too exhausted to realize. And with Chandru, a good friend, my closest coworker, and my strongest source of support at DCSE resigning to accept a government job 2 hours away in Haveri, it looked like it was only due to get worse.

Friday, the day after I was released from the hospital, the first real rain of the season came. Genny and Suzanne, who have been my prime caretakers both during my hospital stay and my recovery, were both at work, leaving me at home to recuperate. I had been sitting in my living room watching Revenge of the Sith on my computer, and I noticed that the noise had picked up outside. It's like I had forgotten what a storm sounded like - I just knew it was loud. I went outside to my porch and was greeted by a fantastic storm. I don't even remember the last time I saw a thunderstorm - Ireland rain tended to be much more tame, and any rain I've experienced here has been negligible. I was in awe. I sat out on my porch steps for nearly an hour, watching it pour, watching the wind whip at the trees, and getting cooled by the sporadic gusts of mist sent in my direction. As the pouring rain had sent everyone inside and emptied the roads, and all other noise had been drowned out by the thunder, all of the normal sounds of Banashankri Layout had been silenced. It was a perfect time to reflect.

Obviously, not everything is negative. I still love working with the Fellows. I love it when I'm teaching, or working directly with people. Some reflection has revealed that if I'm to make the most out of the remaining 2 1/2 months or so, I have to get back to doing the things that I like. Or to doing things that make me feel like I'm learning something. In the beginning, I was learning how to be a teacher. I felt as though the experience had affirmed a calling that I'd already had clues to - working as an educator. Every day I was learning how to do it and how to do it better. Designing blogs and Facebook Pages and writing content are all good accomplishments, but they're not experiences that I feel are teaching me very much.

I need to see more of India. Working in the same office has ceased to be a real and enlightening cultural experience. I've barely seen anything outside of Hubli, and there are still vast gaps in my awareness of what even Hubli has to offer. This means that I have to find time to go elsewhere - allow myself the energy to visit nearby places on Sundays, and make time to see things a little bit farther out on slightly more extended trips. Hopefully, we can make it possible.

I guess this is something that I need to open up a dialogue about once I'm back at work. Hopefully people will be understanding - I think they will be. Since I've arrived there I've been told that they want this experience to be as meaningful for me as possible, and maybe I haven't taken as much advantage of that outlook as I should have. Oh well, we'll see where these next couple weeks take us. Thanks for reading.

Holy crap, I'm a blogger failure

OK, so like 2 full months after my last "real" post, I'm back with the sincerest of apologies. What happened? Well, work went from kinda nuts to REALLY nuts as Pre-Training was ending, sometimes with me getting to work at 6 am or so in order to teach or prepare for teaching and then staying for the whole day, til 8 or 9 in the evening. It was tough but awesome, I loved it even though it worked me to the bone.

I made some downtime for myself this week (not actual downtime, just time in which I felt as though I was entitled to ignore all of the work I had for a little while) and as a result not only do we have this blog post but we have PHOTOS!!! Yes ladies and gentlemen Facebook now hosts a collection of images depicting some key events from my time here so far. Enjoy, and comment generously.

Then, at the end of February, Pre-Training ended and the Fellowship itself began. I kind of thought that this would be a time where I would have nothing to do, but then before Pre-Training was even officially over I got pulled into a series of long crazy meetings and came out of it with a To-Do List that made my head spin. We had to decide on the direction that DFP would be taking in the future, we had to start marketing and recruitment for the next class, meant to be double the size of the current batch, we needed to develop content for the DFP section on the new Deshpande Foundation website, to be launched in the coming months, we had to streamline protocol for Guest Speakers and Module Specialists (teachers) for the current Fellows, etc etc. Personally, I had to put together a plan for a working alumni network, develop a host of marketing materials, create and compile website content, implement a course in Professional Writing for DFP Alumni, and get going on some newsletters and news releases.

While a lot of that sounds cool, what it basically boils down to is a TON of writing. And a ton of writing pretty much the exact same thing, just customized for different formats. Essentially, it means sitting all day staring at a computer. And, it also means that once the day is over, the LAST thing that I've wanted to do is sit down and write more, in the form of a blog post. So, sorry for that.

The adjustment from such an interactive daily experience with the Fellows while I was teaching to the mind-numbing life of an office desk drone was a tough one. OK, those are harsh words. I was doing some interesting things, and I did a lot of things that I am proud of, and I'm happy that I can say I have this kind of experience, but really it was very tough. Going through that transition taught me a valuable lesson about myself and the kind of environment that I need to be able to truly thrive in work.

These days its starting to get better, but I'm definitely learning a lot more about balance than I've ever had to before. On any given day, I'll have 15, 20 things on my plate, which all seem to require ongoing attention. Recruitment for DFP, support for the current Fellows, classes for the Fellows 3 days per week and for alumni on the other 3, trying to hire new co-ops for next term, developing Facebook Pages and Blogs for the program, making sure that all info and application materials can be downloaded online, staying on top of newsletters and posts, the list goes on and on. At least there's variety.

Despite the lack of blogging, SO much has happened in the last month, truly there have been countless times where I've tried to sit down and write. If my internet cooperates for a few minutes, there will be a new photo album to accompany this post so that people can see some cool things and I don't have to explain everything. To sum up, got to see some of the "real" India, as in villages, have managed to be a fairly competent preparer of various forms of Indian cuisine, have met a lot of cool new people, some of whom have come and gone, and I've learned a lot.

Life experiences galore! The most recent of which was a hospital stay due to kidney stones - let's just say that particular experience was character building. I'm interpreting it as my body telling me that I'm working too hard and should take it easy - case in point, I headed back to the office after just one day of post-hospital resting (despite the scolding of the Fellows and my housekeeper), and here the pain has returned to punish me. Don't worry, I already received plenty of "I told you sos" (although people here tend to phrase it much nicer than that). The irony is, I was scheduled to head to the beach for the weekend on Thursday night, but then canceled due to the first hospital trip, which happened Thursday afternoon. Typical.

Well I guess that does about as well as I can do when it comes to summing up the past 2 months. Meeting some great people, forging some (hopefully) life-long friendships, working myself to the bone and learning new things every step of the way. Just for ha-has, let me list a few things that might kill me before I make it back home:

• The heat. It tops 100 degrees every day, and is only getting hotter. And never rains. Until a month from now, when I'll be caught in the middle of the monsoon until the day I leave.
• The bugs. There was a point where I was considering renaming this blog "The Cockroach Adventures". Those of you who saw me freaking out about lizards in the beginning? Forget it. I love lizards. I don't love massive cockroaches/mosquitoes/other things, all of which I seem to be sharing a habitat with.
• The traffic. Every day when I cross the main road to get to/from work, my life flashes before my eyes. Nevermind taking a rickshaw, well, anywhere.

Anyway, that's all for now.

Also, thanks so much to everyone for the birthday wishes, they came at the right time to brighten up my hospital stay. Yes, on my birthday. Shitty. Luckily, the Fellows, my co-workers, and my roommate had thrown me a lovely celebration the night before, so I still got to enjoy. If any of you guys are reading, thanks for that as well!

Miss you all, and take care.

PS: Wanna do something awesome? Become a fan of DFP on Facebook. It's a new fan page and there's a bit of a friendly competition between various DCSE programs to see who can get the most fans. Help me get a victory ;) Go to: www.facebook.com/deshpandefellowship