So, I'm in India. There's really no place to start but there, with that sentence. I'm in India. And to be honest, I'm not really sure how I got here.
I mean, I know how I got here. A stack of forms and signatures, an exciting acceptance letter, more forms and signatures, a few minorly painful vaccinations, a prescription for malaria pills including a long and nasty set of possible side effects (none I which I have experienced, thankfully), an expensive plane ticket, a disastrous visa process, two flights cancelled and changed, $300 in fees, two 6 hour international flights, arrival in Chennai at the crack of dawn, a five hour layover with nothing to do but sit on the stone floor and eat fruit leather, an in-country flight to Kerala and finally, a two hour introduction to the haphazard, every man for himself, stampede-straight-out-of-Africa-style driving that Indians seems to accept as normal and natural. I arrived in a daze, hot and sweaty, severely parched, with a jet-lag hangover. That’s how I got here.
But what I still don’t know is how I got here. Half-way around the world. To India. That’s what I want to find out. And since I’m still nowhere near able to answer that question, and since honestly, one week in India is not at all enough time to develop a clear response anyway, then the best I can do now is to answer the who, the what, the when, and the where. The why can wait. 
I am studying in India for one semester at Pondicherry University, through the IISAC Semester in India Program. The university is located about half an hour (depending on your driver) outside Pondicherry (renamed Puducherry in 2006, but still called Pondicherry or Pondy by all the locals). The campus itself is an endless expanse of dry orange dirt and tall trees, winding roads and paths, fountains and gardens, brightly painted academic buildings and sex-segregated student hostels. The 780 acre campus is surrounded by a high and thick weather-beaten pale pink wall. The ECR (East Coast Road) runs through the middle of the campus like a rushing, rain-swollen river, splitting the campus into two sides, hopelessly divided by impatient drivers, reckless bus conductors and clever, ever-watchful cyclists. One half of the campus is land-bound. The other half runs along the beach.
Pondicherry city is a Union Territory located in Tamil Nadu, one of the 28 states of India. Tamil Nadu is a southern, “conservative” (more traditional), and predominantly vegetarian state. Here they speak Tamil, a soft, flowing language with a sparkling, upbeat rhythm. A typical Tamil conversation will include lots of head bobbling, soft smiles, and eye movements that seem simple, but carry great meaning. The occasional English word can also be heard, heavily accented and wrapped into the conversation wherever convenient.
The national currency is the Indian rupee. The paper bills are a little larger than an American bill and each one depicts a smiling Gandhi on one side. As of this week, the exchange rate is 45 rupees to a dollar. From what I can tell, this rate doesn’t fluctuate much. In the stores, the price in rupees is often indicated by ‘Rs’ preceding a hand-written or stamped number. I am still adjusting to seeing items such as peanut butter, juice, silverware, and bed sheets stamped with numbers like Rs.190, Rs.118, Rs.68 and Rs.155. A cup of chai tea from “the chai guy” down the street, poured theatrically from a pitcher high above his head into another smaller pitcher held hovering above the ground, costs 5 rupees.
If ever there was a time to ponder the implications and significance of culture shock, this is it. The main streets invade your little homemade American bubble with an array of foreign sights, sounds and smells. Loud and angry horns are heard frequently, though the funny clown horns used by smaller cars and auto-rickshaws are also readily and frequently used. An endless rainbow of colors greets your eyes everywhere you turn. Women in saris bend over in green rice patty fields, the ends of the rich colored and beaded cloth flapping in the dry hot wind. Men walk calmly and confidently down the street, weaving through outdoor tea stalls, shade-seeking cows, skeletal dogs too tired to even beg for food, abandoned bikes and lost car parts scattered along the side of the road. Occasionally a man in traditional dress will bend down to tuck in the ends of his dhoti – one large piece of plain cloth that reaches the feet, wrapped around the waist and then tucked or tied, forming a kind of cloth skirt. Younger women walk in groups, holding hands and chatting happily. Many of them prefer to wear the simpler and less cumbersome salwar kameez – a long pair of pants or leggings, a loose-fitting shirt that reaches the knees, and a scarf pinned around their shoulders. There is so much to learn from a culture where many women still proudly display the red bindi on their forehead, where people from all classes and castes eat meals with their right hand, where 90% of families are still formed through arranged marriages.
The son of the woman who established the ashram where the SIP students will practice yoga twice a week asked us today if we called our program the “Semester in India Program” or the “Study in India Program”. He said he hoped eventually we would all come to call it the “Study in India Program” because that’s really what we are here for: to study India. To study in India. To study about India. To study with India. And from all that studying, with a little luck, we might even learn something.
