I've been a very bad boy

Bugger.  I was being so good.  Yoga everyday, working in an environment without drink where the only promiscuity was between the local dogs.  Then Goa came along and reminded me of the dark side.  So the month before I train to become a yoga teacher I’ve been doing no yoga, hanging out with non veg girls with tatoos (controversial) and, having a bloody marvelous time. Highlights include:

• I return to the land of Poor Intimacy 

 

• I preach Sex Ed 'Justin Timberlake' style
• I say goodbye to some very special people 
• I am James Bond (for those of you who didn’t know already)

  

(please note this picture was taken before I started eating Indian cuisine)

• I finally start to find myself and get TURBANATED
• Love marraige vs. Arranged and...I find religion
• You get the chance to win a prize (aswell as reading this blog - you so lucky ;) )
• +++ GOOD NEWS +++ After all my winging in my last blog I got a 50% refund from my Hotel from Hell in Goa (see the review here)

Being back in the jungle was just what I need after the madness of Goa. Walking around in a perfect climate with beaming children saying Namaste Kriiiis and the thud of the local puppies finding their mobility against the back of your leg once in a while.  The mealtimes were hilarious.  You walk into a room of 200 children eating and feel like you are in a human bidding war as they all smile as hard as they can to have the foreigner sit next to them and then after doing the routine 'what is your name' pretty much ignore you (I am less interesting than rice!).  

As I might have mentioned before, I love the home of 18again, Bangalore.   There were some downsides though.  My fundraising colleague (who keeps reminding me that he is now studying an MBA) maintained his cultural naivety   On the first night in the hotel he put coffee and milk 'inside' the kettle and boiled it.  And at a grand old age of 25 I had to tell him how to use a western toilet, every night.  To put it simply, the twin room had an odor like a sleeper train and in the end I had to tell him to use the toilet sitting down.  Was it a challenging week? Erm, Yes.

Day 1 of Bangalore meetings I was suffering from a slight overindulgence in the Bangalore nightlife.  After a few hours kip and news that our driver (as an NGO we get a driver and car donated :) ) had cancelled we had to jump into a Rickshaw and head to do a shoot at a famous actor's house.  For those of you who have travelled in a Rickshaw you'll know that they aren't the best place to dictate a script for a film shoot on your laptop.....in a foreign language   To top it all off we got totally lost (normal) and the Rickshaw driver got out to get directions and forgot to put the brake on and the auto rans down the hill (not normal)

 

Me after 4 hours sleep chatting with legendary Film director, actor and poet Girish Karnad.  


The rest of the week in Banglore involved meeting senior policy staff in large corporates to partner with the school project KSV.  Last time we were there we met +150 companies in one week (speed networking) this time we met only 6 but they were the big guns and it was a great week for KSV.  One of my favourites was HCL, one of the largest Indian computer firms.  We had had a meeting cancelled and whilst my colleague (Mr MBA) struggled with the complex world of switching on his computer I decided to try and get some on spec meetings.  Electronic City and Whitefield are business parks that have both had terrorist attacks and are constantly getting threats so there are guards at all the really large corporates behind sandbags with machine guns.  Something, I hadn't seen since visiting Syria and quite out of place among all the polished educated Indians.  HCL was no different, with big signs stating 'Present Photo ID' at Security Gate.  Everyone was stopping.  I didn't have my ID with me so I walked straight pass security and to reception where I asked to see the CSR Director.  I only got 5 minutes of his time but my visitor pass was #007 and they never did a security check on me.   Another classic was that as the largest LCD producer in India they have DELL LCDs at reception :)

When you spend time working with someone in a hotel room you get to know that person pretty well. I'm guessing whoever I share a room with generally gets to know more about me than I know about them but that's the joy of being an only child right?!  So I tell Mr MBA all about my life and I learn about arranged marriage vs. love marriage in India and I try to mix that up with some of the cultural chats I've had with the more liberal Indians I have met here.  I won't bore you with the details but after a philosophical chat I ended up lshowing my colleague the below Justin Timberlake video.  I really hope I haven't ruined his honeymoon....

Note.  I respect the cultural disparity between the west and most of India.  I've had lots of chats with very conservative people here and the party crew and just felt the time was right to introduce The Lonely Island to India :)

On the sleeper train coming back I thought I was being a legend by being the first to jump on (as it was rolling into the station) to ensure my bed.  However, in my moment of pride I got overconfident and put my luggage under the seats (normally the premium spot) before having a look around.  Only issue was I'd packed my breakfast in there (I was in the Boy Scouts) and there was a rat colony on the carriage. 3 bananas full of teeth marks.  Lovely.

My last few days in at KSV were amazing.  I finished all my fundraising governance training and am confident I've taught the team to 'fish' ie developed a sustainable programme, put some solid fundraising processes in place (inc raising a fair amount of cash :) ) and taught myself alot about patience (...I still don't have much).   I had taken photos of kids in the school and people from the local village and as most of them don't have photos, let alone of themselves I printed them all off and took them round the village.  It was my Bob Geldolf moment as I had a stream of screaming kids skipping behind me and was promised chai at every house I made my photo delivery too.  I gotta admit, quite a buzz.  Here are a few of the +150 snaps:

Me having chai with Enok

Sujata ,the little girl I sponsor at KSV.  And me wearing socks in 30 degrees (the jungle had made my feet sick so I was looking after them!)

 

Some of the kids in the local village

The below video is a little taster of the school.  Most children are doing their academic studies so it's very quiet but you get the idea.  It's a pretty special place!

(note that Volunteer Marie was having a bad day due to the Monkies raiding her room - she is not normally zso grumpy)

The last few nights the we pushed the boat out and stayed up past 1030 a rarity in the jungle and a real treat for me to leave with a big group of kids all screaming "Goodbye Kriis" and a proper sendoff from the volunteers in the nearest town.  I'll miss the place, it showed me India without any tourists, an amazing projects and some very special people.

The sleeper bus from Dharwad didn't have any rats but despite me upgrading to Sleeper class (I got a bed!) I was tossed like a pancake for most of the night then at 3am the bus filled up all the empty beds with local workers travelling to Bombay which kinda changed the oudor of the bus a little and with 5 people per bed  meant my chance to sleep was gone. 

My trip to Mumbai was to Lovey (a friend I'd met in Goa)'s Wedding. I knew Lovey was pretty well off but I've been to the home of Indian Film stars and musicians and his place was blingER!  The wedding was a real treat.  Punjabi food, dancing and girls made me seriously consider changing race!  I even had a student of famous Indian dancer Nanzeen Gujral teach me moves on the dancefloor. My simple definition of bollywood dancing is alot of body isolation whilst pretending you are opening door knobs.  I also found that my beard came in handy as I got turbanated.

Me after I was turbanated with the prettiest girl at the wedding (exl the bride ;) )

The ceremony was pretty special as and I was so far behind on sleep I had a cheeky little snooze.  Lucky for me in an Indian wedding whilst sat on the floor sleeping just looks like you are meditating.   Working in Corporate Sponsorship I should be used to seeing the poorest people one day then dining in 5 star hotels when meeting important donors the next but I found it hard to deal with the wealth gap at the wedding after coming straight from the school.  You know you are talking to wealthy Indians when they say proudly that they spent their last holiday in Devon.  My childhood caravan holiday to Devon when all my friends were living it up in Spain should be noted.  At the wedding reception where the typical answer to "What do you do for a living" was Actor one guest said to me that they found me working with the poor people 'depressing' from behind their designer sunglasses.  Disparity, like in any developing country is something you see everyday, and lucky for me the majority of the wedding party were more down to earth.   

A few simple pleasures from Jan I wanted to share with you:

• Walking through a crowded train stations listening to music whilst dancing (throwing in the occassional bodypop or moonwalk which seems to work really well with a backpack).  Only issue is last time I did that I was listening to a mashup then the music shuffled to Fraggle Rock...
• Sharing headphones with a local on the bus and walking through a basic music discography from The Beatles to SHM (soon makes you realise that even The Beatles lyrics are raunchy!).
• Hanging off the side of a train or a government bus and just breathing in India (normally through your mouth)  
• Leaning out of the car and feeling the buzz of just how close that bus or motorbike handle bar is to your face

Fav phrases of the month:

• When having a chat about arranged marriage vs. love marriage with Mr MBA (bear in mind his is a LOVE marraige but based on very conservative principles).  "Are you sexually attracted to your girlfriend" No sir.  "Will you be sexually attracted to your girlfriend after you are married "I will have to be

• "Good Morning Afternoon sir"

• "It's very cheek in tongue"

• "Please yes, I must get off this phone conversation right now I have a foreigner in my office, yes very important"

• "Goodbye Kriis".......screamed at me by around 50 kids at the school as I left

A big thank you to all of you who called.  It is good to hear from people at home.  I even got excited when I heard a West Cork accent on the beach today and I'm not from Cork ;)

I now have a postal address so please feel free to send me A Valentines Card, bottle of fine wine or efferversent Vic C Pills (for some reason they don't trust pills that fizz here). There is little else I miss apart from you guys so as I'll be here until at least the Summer of 2013 why not send YOURSELF on a little holiday :)

My address: 

Mr Flack
c/o WaterAd India Liaison Office
403-408, 4th Floor, CNI Bhavan
16 Pandit Pant Marg,
New Delhi-110 001
India

So for now I'm spending a few days in Varkala in S. Kerala.  It's a gorgeous beach and very Shanti Shanti compared to Goa with less people and no bars on the beach.  I've made friends with a Swiss guy who has been travelling for 3 years and has a beard so big that mine makes me look like I'm going through puberty.  I've only been here for a few days but it's gorgeous to wake with a beach full of people doing yoga, tha chi, meditation and surfing amungst all the locals doing their puja.

I have found my favourite yoga teacher and hidden beach but this still is a tourist town so on the main beach there is the game of "boys watching girls watching boys watching girls" and I'll often join in as there are some damn fine yogi atheistics.  You can sit watching the girls go by drinking beer out of a tea pot as non of the bars have licenses.   The standard Indian tourist attraction sentence is the same here as other places "Hello Friend" "I have >insert product you are most likely already wearing so clearly don't need< for just 200 RS".  The only difference between here and Goa was that you don't get a pause then "Cocaine, MDMA" at the end.  I prefer it here!

Seeing as I'm only a few days from embarking on my Yoga Teacher Training course I have started to practice yoga again.  I've also been to a few Osho meditations and was quite alarmed that I left alone ;)

As far as finding myself.  I guess I'm now beginning to admit that, I am, a ginger.  I am still however, struggling with patience.  I had a date with a gorgeous indian girl in Goa and I left as she was 45 minutes left.  Shanti Shanti Chris!

For those of you who are worried that I'll be going cold turkey into the Yoga teacher training after a mad January, don’t worry here are some reassuring facts:

• I have been drinking at least one fresh coconut water/day to make up for all my impurities
• There are 30 girls and 5 guys doing the TTC course

I'll try to post some Yogi updates during my YTT in Cochin.  It's 0530-2130 for a month and with all those hip openers you might get to see a very different Chris!  After that I'll be starting my next project in Delhi with Waterad. Namaste.

PS.  Prize for the funniest comment of THIS photo.....