This Just In...

It is certainly strange to hear important news from home while I'm in India. I have more frequent Internet than I ever expected for my summer in Jaipur, so not only have I been trying to keep up with the happenings in people's personal lives via the Facebook, but I've also been reading about national news. And a lot has been going on, to say the least. Don't get me wrong. It's not that the Internet is a strange medium to receive important news. I live in a college bubble most of the year, and that is often the only way to find out news. It's more that my life here in Jaipur is a strange setting to receive a lot of the news I'm receiving. I'm wearing my India goggles and they make things feel stranger, fatter, and harder to get my mind around.

Okay, that's enough vagueness.

I'm writing this in light of the recent news that George Zimmerman was declared not guilty of second degree murder of Trayvon Martin. From my perch in the common area of my host family's house, I've also read about the Supreme Court decision regarding marriage rights, several friends' engagements and marriages, news of illnesses and death, movies' success at the box office, and the everyday ups and downs of my closest friends' lives, among other things. This post is not a revelation that people's lives are going on and changing even while I am an ocean and a continent away. No, instead, this is a realization at how strange it is to process all of this news in a different culture and language, surrounded by a collection of people unlike any I've ever been surrounded by before this summer. 

With the Supreme Court decision to recognize marriages between people of the same sex, I was struck by how different "marriage rights" are in India compared to back home. Here, heteronormative culture is rampant and seems unchallengeable. Marriage rights involve the ages of the man and woman involved, the discontinuation of the traditional dowry paid to a husband's family, marriage across caste lines, gender roles within a marriage, and arranged versus love marriage (I've had the latter conversation with so many different locals). But with both India and the States' contemporary concepts of marriage rights, there are people who are privileged to not have to think about it and there are people who come face to face with it everyday. I have met some women at the women's center where I've been teaching English who have been directly affected by the rights they are allotted in marriage as women. I both love hearing their stories and am crushed by the reality they deal with. On the other hand, one of my host sisters recently got engaged and is fortunate enough to be marrying a man she loves and truly wants to marry. Just like any relationship, I know she has faced some controversy, some obstacles. But I don't believe she has to think about marriage rights on a daily basis.  Back at home, I have friends who are not so fortunate and who have had to think a lot about laws and social expectations regarding marriage. I wonder how their lives will change because of this new development. I wonder how this new decision will affect the culture, the religion, the social climate...I am antsy to see it first hand!

With the Zimmerman trial, I can watch the racial tensions play out on my Facebook news feed. Racial tensions exist here in India, too, but they don't hit so close to home for me (well, that expression works on so many different levels). In this moment, I wish I could be back to hear the frustrations, the controversies, the thoughts about what this means for different communities...because I worry it will blow over by the time I return (in less than a month). I worry that the cries of "Where has justice gone?" will have been silenced by time and acceptance of the turn of events. For now, though, I will watch and wait. Maybe I will let this news open doors here to talk about the complex relationships between people of different races, religions, castes, etc. as they affect people in Jaipur. 

Today my heart is heavy for all that I feel like I am missing--not the food (oh my word, I want waffles so badly) or the AC, not Starbucks or blue jean shorts (where I come from, we call those "jorts"), but the experiences, conversations, and presence that I am not able to share. Let's be real, though. I'm in India, a place I've wanted to be for quite some time now. I'm not having the same experiences and conversations as my community back home, but the ones I am having are great, most excellent, very very good, madame! Sorry, that's what all the shopkeepers like to yell at me about the quality of their wares. I digress. 

Well, I'm off for some more Sunday adventures. Until next time, may your mango chutney always be unexpectedly spicy.