Bangalore, India – February 1st, 2008

 

A driver picked us up at the Bangalore Station.  Train station pick-ups in 1st world countries are one thing, where if you don’t get picked up it’s not a big deal.  In India, as two lone white girls, it makes all the difference in the world.  It feels as if we have signs on our heads flashing ‘I’m easily scammed, pick me up’.  Everyone is desperate to drive us, and even having a driver leading us to a car only slightly deters them.  I can only imagine if we actually needed one of them to take us.  The driver who was taking us to the school we’re volunteering at didn’t seem to speak English, so the 2 hour car ride was uninterrupted with conversation.  We drove & we drove, Evy & I having no idea how long it was likely to take, and after driving along road after road we finally got to a dusty path.  Finally.  We traveled along the dusty path past various shacks & wondered what we were getting ourselves into.  Then suddenly we were driving along a highway again.  I guess it was a short cut. 

At the next small town the driver pulled over at a store.  ‘Wait 5 minutes’.  Ok.  We sat and watched as he went over to a pay phone and made a call.  It seemed our driver had maybe lost his way.  Evy suggested that perhaps he was calling ahead to get them to roll out the red carpet, an idea that we found highly amusing.  The driver got back in the car but apparently the call was unsatisfactory in some manner because he pulled up to the next payphone 3 stores ahead and went to make another.  Hmmm…  Then we kept driving.  The countryside got progressively more country-like.  I hadn’t fully realized how hectic Mumbai is until we drove out into this calm outdoors.  It was great. 

When we finally reached the school we had to go through a big gate.  It turns out we’re not allowed outside that gate, now that we’re residing inside.  Creepy much?! Apparently the locals don’t like the school, so it’s dangerous for us to go out that way.  Out the other way, toward the fields etc. are jackals (wild dogs) which apparently aren’t much fun either.  It feels distinctly like a setting for a film or horror story of some sort.  I should also mention that from 10pm – 6am a guard patrols the grounds, whistling every 30 seconds to call out an all-clear & I’m still alive to the guard sitting at the central tower station.  Altogether it makes for a bit of a ‘I’m jailed’ feeling, but as it’s a nice school & very nice grounds it’s not too bad.