Sean, Maurine and I decided to take a little walk into the
village the this afternoon. The village is just down the road from us-but it is
different then the junction that is farther down the road. The village is a lot
more quaint and humble. There are some nicer houses, but most houses are made
out of sticks with thatched roofs. There are dirt paths, a temple with a
courtyard, a little shrine on the way into the village, a few little shops and
a lot of happy village dwellers. Some of the students on campus come from the
village. Those kids don’t live on campus like the other kids do, but they were
all still in school when we took our walk around. The adults of the village
were chilling around though and kept calling/motioning to us to get out of the
sun and drink water. They made sure to address how much we were sweating and
one lady was kind enough to point out the zit I have on my cheek. Why thank you
Madame, I had forgotten I am almost thirty and still get acne from time to time.
Have I mentioned Indians are very blunt? If I have mentioned it then it is
worth mentioning again, simply because it is such a huge part of this culture I
currently live in.
We decided to take a path on our left, which led down a row
of houses and then to a dirt path that had a house/farm on one side (maybe it
wasn’t a farm, there could of just been animals there too because animals are
everywhere) and crops on the other. A little girl ran out from the “farm” (she
was too young for school so she was at home) and appointed herself tour guide
for the three of us—speaking Tamil the whole time. She led us up the rest of
the dirt path, and around the corner to another path, which eventually led us
back to the main road—but getting to the main road was the best. The other
villagers saw she was leading us and they stopped us to say hi, asked to have
their pictures taken, and of course to then see the pictures. One of my
favorite things to do when traveling is to get out and interact with the locals
and they go about their daily lives. It is so unscripted and natural. And even
though you usually can’t verbally communicate with locals, there is plenty of
communication that happens through smiles and laughs and other motions. I
particularly loved how this village seemed to have a good sense of community.
For example our little tour guide was wondering all over but all the adults
were watching her, giving her instructions, making sure she was safe, etc. It
reminded me of the saying that goes something like “it takes a whole village to
raise a child”. I may have just slaughtered that but oh well. I know what I
mean.
