Maintaining a Sense of Self in Jaipur

One challenge about learning a new language in another country with 33 other students I just met 4 weeks ago is that I have been stripped of myself in so many ways. I don't have the vocabulary yet to talk about much more than daily happenings, food, shopping, Bollywood movies, and religion. This is definitely more of a range than when I arrived in Jaipur at the American Institute of Indian Studies, but it's still frustrating. I'm experiencing so much in the classroom and out in the city that I want to have in depth conversations about, but I feel limited by the fact that I'm supposed to be speaking Hindi or that the people around me haven't known me for long and have very different interests. 

I had one small success today, though! In my weekly literature class we always discuss a Hindi short story that is usually absurdly difficult for my group to comprehend. For the past couple weeks, our conversations have been purely about the plot and the characters. And I have felt like a complete idiot because my contributions have been so limited. I spent two years at College of Charleston studying English literature, so naturally I have a lot more to say about the Hindi pieces than I can actually articulate in Hindi. But today my classmates and I (I have the best group ever) went above and beyond our adhyapak's questions, reaching into the depths of the relationship between American bosses and Indian employees, the generation gap and how it fits into the cultural expectation of respecting one's parents, and the exoticism of India by Westerners. We also dipped some into our English vocabulary, but I was nevertheless excited and proud to be having a meaningful conversation mostly in this language that I still struggle to get my tongue around sometimes. Our teacher wasn't quite as impressed, and at one point, after we diverged off into our world of themes and symbols, he stopped us to repeat his question, "But what does the mom do?" I laughed because laughter is the first answer to language frustration and cultural awkwardness. 

I am feeling trapped by my limited vocabulary, by being a foreign woman in Jaipur, by the program rules and schedules. But it seems okay as long as I can hold onto conversations like the one in my literature class today and as long as I can return to my business of asking questions and challenging ideas. 

Also, I found dark chocolate and a park to read and write and think in, so I feel much more myself again.

He who by virtue of his rank, his actions,

And qualities, effects no useful purpose

Is like a chance-invented word; his birth

Is useless, for he merely bears a name.

--Indian wisdom