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No self-portrait.

I’m losing even this vice!

The long-awaited, prematurely celebrated 18th birthday arrives…finally… tomorrow!

Since no one will call me, I will content myself with birthday wishes via fotolog!

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PART 4

Fortunately, I’m not the only one, Megan from Los Angeles is in the same situation, though I’m worse off than she. We meet the head of Woodstock’s elementary school, in a car with her daughter. She offers us a ride. When we arrived at her house she was showing us the path to return to the dorms when I started vomiting. She very kindly hosted me at her house, offering me a sofa where I could lie down for a few hours, and some medicine (I was convinced I was going to die). Thinking it over, I am a bit irritated that I met her under those conditions.

I had to pass on the chocolate cake that the dorm supervisor had made for Julia, but I’m sure that when it’s time for my own birthday I’ll be able to eat some (always counting on my good karma!).

It was stormy at the start, but hearing girls who already homesick and thinking they want to go home early annoys me. I’m here and I’m proud of that! Every day just getting to school is a job, but it’s been a while since I lived a life based on satisfactions that I sweated for and earned.

All it takes is a sense of irony, an ability to laugh at the fact that I spent the whole day almost-fainting and vomiting! To laugh at the fact that, when I raise my head from the paper during a test and look out the window, I see a monkey.

To laugh at the fact that a mouse got into my room and it’s still barricaded in there!

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PART 2

In the room of that Julia who today (Aug 4, 2007) is 17 years old and will be my classmate.

Continuing the story of the trip:

We spent a day in New Delhi. Because very few of us, among them me, had rupees, and the banks refused to change our dollars, most of us couldn’t shop. We all discovered that in India, if you’re white and obviously well-off, in 90 places out of 100 you’re persecuted by herds of begging children. Very cute, yes. If you give money to one, you’ll end up being tortured until you give to all. If you pay the least attention to what they’re doing, you’ll have them on your heels for as long as you’re in the area. I ignored them until the last minute, resisting the temptation to slap one when he pinched me!

Once on the bus – that is, in safety – I went crazy photographing them, discovering that they love to pose.

Day 2 in Delhi: The wake-up call comes at 4:30, at 5:00 I’m eating toast and drinking mango juice and at 6:30 I’m in Delhi Central Station. It took us seven hours, which became eight, to get to Dehra Dun. Fortunately, the boy sitting next to me and I kept each other entertained with conversation and paper games.

Having arrived where the air lacks oxygen, we all collapsed on mattresses, sofas, or whatever. Myself and two others were awakened by hunger. We decided to head for the dining hall, not knowing or caring what time it was or where our other companions in adventure might be. We arrive and are, in fact, the only ones. We snack on various versions of curry, rice and vegetables served to us, then – paradise: a bowl of mangoes.

I don’t let myself be fooled by the yellow-green-brown skin. I peel, cut, and taste. Fleshy, sweet, juicy, DIVINE. For years I’ve been dreaming, between juices and ice creams, of the real flavor, the real experience of a mango. It was an immense satisfaction. "I think I could get used to this," ironically comments the first Amanda I’ve ever known.

MomComm: Anybody who can wax so delirious over a mango is clearly ready to appreciate India. I had told Ross for years that the mangoes we had in the Caribbean and the poor, sad things imported to Europe just weren’t the real experience. I’m glad she found the real thing up to her expectations.

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PART 1

You feel welcomed to India when you have spent the day vomiting and trying to find a position in which it doesn’t feel as if someone is cutting you open from the inside and pouring rock salt on the wound.

Just so: my first day of Himalayan life was a day of near-faints and general illness.

Aug 1, 2007

I arrive at London airport excited about, if not entirely conscious of, my imminent departure.

Everything seems to go smoothly until I discover that I wasn’t allowed two bags of 20 kilos each, but only one. Then I discover that the excess baggage charge would be 24 pounds sterling per kilo. You do the math!

Fortunately, my weeping was more effective than the shrill yells of my infuriated mother: a young Indian who worked for the airline took pity on me and managed to convince the hostess at check-in to give me a huge discount…

Now I’m alone running across the airport hoping I don’t miss the flight. Since I didn’t receive the t-shirt from the exchange program, which was supposed to help us recognize each other, I did my best with one that had the school logo on it. In fact I am soon recognized by one of the tribe of kids who is wearing a bright orange t-shirt at least three sizes too big!

I introduce myself, conversation begins with the usual questions that the occasion demands. I think to myself: “For a year, they will be part of my life.”

The arrival in New Delhi is a relief for all who, in spite of exhaustion and jet lag, are fascinated by the first impact of India and the enormity of the hotel we’re staying at.

I’m sharing a room with an American girl who has been living in Paraguay for many years. She explains to me that she’s a bit afraid because, even though the city where she lives is a lot more dangerous than India, she’s used to having body guards, guards outside the houses, armored windows, etc.

I’m proud of myself because the arrival in a place so drastically different from my home has not disturbed me in the least! I manage to stay awake and active, participate in conversations, and generally I think everybody likes me.

The girl I was talking about before, just now as I was writing, started to yell like the damned. She’s in the room across from mine. I decide not to react, until a rat runs into my room, and I understand what the yells were about.

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