...To within an inch of my sanity!

Yeesh!

So this might be the first time in all of my travels that I have experienced the peaks and valleys that come with the transition. Emphasis on the valleys. I suspect that the reason my spirit is effectively killed and my mood is almost constantly in the dumps may have something to do with the consistent 12-14 (spiking to 18-20!!) hour days that I've been working at the DCSE, from which I have to immediately transition into student-mode to write the papers that if you've been reading you know have been haunting me for nearly a month now. Naturally, after working for 14 hours, my natural inclination is to do something like a) sleep, b) eat, or c) turn on my computer and engage in mindless activities like facebook, texts from last night, and following the latest developments in the Conan O'Brien situation. Usually "c" wins, followed soon after by "a". Sometimes "a" wins outright. "B" seems to have fallen by the wayside almost completely.

Anyway, I have never before in these experiences had the feeling like "Ugh, this blows. I want to go home." It seems as though at all times, at least 50% of my brain is concentrating on home. What would I be doing if I was home? (sleeping). What would I be eating if I was at home (food that I could identify). Who would I be talking to if I was at home? (someone who could actually understand me and talk back).

Simple, under-recognized luxuries like knowing where to buy food! So you can cook! Like not having to lock your bedroom door - with a padlock - every time you leave the house. Like not seeing men peeing in the street at least once per day. After nearly three weeks I am still in this kind of limbo, where people need to take care of me and show me where to go to accomplish the simplest things, for no reason other than I simply have not had time to figure them out myself. When she was taking out the trash yesterday, our housekeeper pointed to the box from some of the pre-made meals I have been making (basically just curry that you heat up and put on rice). She very clearly disapproved and made some remarks in Kannada that I couldn't understand. I tried to explain - "no, I don't WANT to eat it. I like fresh things! Fruit! It's all I can do right now!" My explanation was lost on her.

Not having food/time for breakfast every morning (increasing sleep deficit makes it harder and harder to get up on time) means that the antibiotics I have to take every day while I'm here bring on a pretty miserable variation of morning sickness, daily. When I am able to eat - the DCSE staff gets lunch delivered on most days, which I can usually sneak a 10 minute break for - its a crapshoot whether or not the food I eat will bring on all sorts of fun symptoms with it (yep, still adjusting.)

Basically - yuckyuckyuckiwannagohomeyuck .

But like I said, I've done this enough and been exposed to enough literature and lectures on "adaptation" and "culture shock" and the like to know that this very probably is, like I said before, just a phase. And it seems like maybe, just maybe, the heavens have shined upon me and given me a chance to recharge. Development Dialogue, an annual international conference on development that the Deshpande Foundation hosts in Hubli each year, begins Wednesday. This same conference which has been demanding I work 14 hour days for the past 2 weeks in order to prepare AND teach also means that all of my classes are canceled all week so that the Fellows (my students) can act as volunteers for the program. Woo! It would seem that everything I'm able to contribute to has already been finished.

Example: How many publications do you think need to be put together for an international conference? As most of those publications (speaker bios, brochures, case studies, flyers, invitations, letters...) were written by people who speak English as a second language, they all need to be proofread before they can be released. Who is the resident English expert at the Deshpande Center for Social Entrepreneurship? That's right, yours truly. On the bright side, I am now extremely well versed in the who's-who of the social entrepreneurship field as well as extremely knowledgeable on some of the Sandbox's most successful development initiatives and NGOs. The downside? I no longer remember what it feels like to be "rested", and my eyesight may have been permanently damaged from excessive reading.

But like I said, it seems like at least for a short period of time, a weight has been lifted. The Hindu gods that I mentioned were hazing me in a previous post seemed to have thought that I've had enough, shown good spirit and commitment in the face of extensive difficulties. So while I'm on my own for the cold showers and the hard mattress and the rogue farm animals and the strange chirping lizards that have made my house their home, they are lightening the load just enough that maybe JUST MAYBE I'll be able to recoup some sleep and get these essays done, finally.

Before I left I had the foresight to smuggle a bottle of malbec into my suitcase, as I had heard that procuring a drink in this particular part of India is somewhere on the difficult side. The original idea was that after I had completed my 30+ hour journey, it would be nice to be able to unwind. But when I got here, I decided that I didn't need it. I'd save it for a part of the trip when I deserved a true reward, when something deserved to be celebrated. It's very likely that I will not be able to think of a better occasion than when the last of my essays is submitted - on Wednesday if all goes according to plan.

Anyway, that's my life at the moment. The coming weeks will bring their own new challenges and projects, but that's for later. For now, send all the spirit of productivity and motivation and endurance and energy that you can spare over this way, I'll be forever grateful and I'll definitely be needing it over the next couple days. If it works, expect an elated, celebratory post in the very near future.

Cheers all, missing you as always.

PS: If you're interested, you can learn more about Development Dialogue 2010 HERE.

ADDENDUM: I thought this was worth mentioning. A little hilarious/absurd anecdote, just so everyone can understand how ridiculous this place is. In preparation for the Dialogue, we have to make sure that all safety systems, etc within the building are working properly. So today, we had a fire drill. Understandable. Legitimate. Called for. Please continue reading.

I have heard different reasons for why this occurred. One version of the story is that the director of DCSE "wanted the fire drill to be taken seriously." Another is "well the systems here don't have a mechanism where you can set it off manually." Both of these reasons seem a little bit absurd to me. The first one for obvious reasons, the second one because you could very easily just light a match under the detector to achieve the desired result.

What ACTUALLY happened was this. Someone went out to the woodsy area nearby and collected a couple armfuls of brush. Which they then carried to the third floor of the building. Which they then LIT ON FIRE. Yes, that's right. In order to initiate a fire "drill," DCSE actually started a real live FIRE in the building. A large one. There was smoke everywhere. You could see the fire on the 3rd floor from the ground outside. I didn't check, but there are probably scorch marks on the floor. Now I'm not up on the particulars of fire drills, but I'm pretty sure that having an actual fire involved negates the "drill" part. Just sayin.

India is weird.