Lately I’ve found myself missing India increasingly often.
.
When I returned to Europe in 2009 from a trip that lasted more than three years and included lots of travel around India, studying yoga in Mysore and long trips to nearby countries including Thailand, Singapore and Nepal, I was more than ready to leave Asia. Europe was, in my mind, a paradise where everything is clean and efficient and functions perfectly. Europe was the dreamland with no cheating rickshaw drivers and no bureaucracy that has been created to extract bribes from foreigners by driving us so mad that we’d be happy to pay anything just so we would not have to fill in another inexplicable piece of paper. Europe was a place that had decent bread (and that means bread that is baked in an oven and is not flat), non-spicy food, cheese that actually tastes like cheese. My Dream Europe had cold crispy winter mornings and people who would get things done in three working days without asking for a “present”.
The disappointment was so great that I am still not sure if I am going through a reverse culture shock that has lasted over two years, or if my mind had simply created an illusion of Europe that never existed in reality.
I know I’m lumping the whole Europe here in the same category. The main disappointment was Switzerland, the land of chocolate and cheese and efficiency and quality, of which I found the first two in abundance but noticed the last two lacking somewhat. But it’s not just Switzerland: the Europe I missed while I was in India is falling apart.
I still love the food: the bread, the chocolate, the cheese. I still love the peace and quiet and privacy that I missed so much in the constant noise that is India. But in I also feel increasingly lost, disillusioned and out of place.
The European efficiency and quality are simply not there anymore. While the cost of living has gone up, the quality of pretty much everything has gone down. We pay more and more for services and products that give us less and less value and take longer and longer to be delivered. People have to work more and more for less money and for no job security, hard-working honest people who thought they were pretty secure are suddenly struggling to make ends meet (while others can afford to pay £136 million for a penthouse flat in London yet refuse to pay council tax), the job market keeps reminding us that absolutely nothing in life is certain – not even that job you have been doing for the last 30 years and thought you’d be doing until you retire. While all that affects how I feel, I am also feeling out of touch and out of place with smaller things. The conversations I hear people having about the American Idol (I mean who gives a feck?) and other crap like that are so foreign, so alien and so irrelevant to me that I’m wondering if it would have been better to stay in India.
I miss many things from India: green coconuts, palm trees, sunsets over the ocean, old ladies selling garlands of fresh flowers on the street, cows walking around as if they ruled the world. But what I really miss is about travelling in India is that feeling of living in the moment, not knowing what will happen the next day or the day after, having a tentative travel plan but knowing that you might end up doing something completely unplanned anyway.
I actually like to have a routine and I even develop routines quickly when I travel, but sometimes it is also good to shake your routines up a little and travel is an obvious way to do that. And it is not just chilling out in a hammock that I miss. When I travel I like to have a purpose and I like to work (hence the poorly paid but time-consuming career in travel writing). Most of the time on my three years of travels I was pretty busy with stuff. Interesting stuff.
But of course now India is making it harder and harder for us to go there. Not that long ago it was possible for a Finnish passport holder to get a 5-year tourist visa for India from the Indian embassy in Helsinki in three working days. Now the visa process has been outsourced (yeah, you know what’s going to happen when you hear that word) and the maximum you can get is a year (but you’ll still have to get out after 6 months and not go back in for 2 months), it costs a lot more than before, and people on discussion forums are talking about 4-week processing times. Oh, and you have to provide proof of a valid travel insurance or you can’t even apply!
So I keep thinking about India and I find myself increasingly thinking about all that was good about travel in India. How do you bring all that back to your life in the West? How do you survive the shock of returning “home” when home is not what it used to be? And what is it about India that keeps calling us back? What is it about India that gets so under our skin?
Merry Christmas, happy holidays and let’s hope that 2012 will be a better year for me, for you and for the world than 2011!
“And what is it about India that keeps calling us back? What is it about India that gets so under our skin?”
I guess you can find the answer in Shantaram, by Gregory David Roberts. But why would I get the feeling that you already know the answer..:)
I have never ventured outside India, but about the mundane conversations involving American Idol, I understand how you feel. In my opinion, I dont think you should limit that particualr disappointment only to Europe. I guess wherever there is some urban touch, you are bound to find David Lettermans or Jay Lenos or a bit of Hollywood or a tinge of Bollywood..
Being a traveller, you have visited in India some places which are truly very unexplored. Education hasnt touched the people of those desolate places, let alone popular cultures/electronic media. Its that freshness, transparency of the people which, I guess, would touch the hearts and minds of any open minded treveller. I am not sure how much urban India you have experienced, but we have our version of American Idols, and there is a very well defined city life which is influenced by the west. Funny enough, its this populace, which the western travellers find repulsive…:). I wonder why.
I’ve been to Mumbai, Delhi, Bangalore and Chennai. I didn’t spend very long in any of the cities so I can’t say much about them, but except for some great sights and tourist attractions I did not like them at all. India is going the same way the West did and is making the same mistakes we did.
I guess Westerners are still going to India looking for an alternative to the mess we’ve managed to create in our own countries. The West went for the idea that material wealth and the illusion of endless economic growth would make us happy. Look at the West now: the economy is a shambles, and emotionally and spiritually we are empty and pathetic. Even in the countries that believed in equality and the welfare state that should take care of all (such as my home country Finland) people are increasingly being divided into those who have a lot and those who have very little. The environment is a mess. Family structures and communities have broken down, kids have no respect towards their parents and the parents don’t give a shlt, we have no morals to speak of and we are lazy and decadent. And this is where many parts of India are heading too in their admiration of all things Western.
It was nice to find your blog and I have actually enjoyed following your travels experiences. well India has many great places to visit…
Wow great to see u exploring India !! So how is India ?? But i agree to your point ,Since India is vast widespread ..When south Indian people travel to north side they get cheated similar way for the outbound tourists too ..i dono how far you have been cheated by someone in India ..that’s the only problem you can find everywhere … Its sad !! Like you mentioned we do have that rich class people and low class people , corruption but in south India mostly below Chennai you cannot find a nuclear family type .. I m happy coz i m from south side (Tamil Nadu) .
Sheril Benedict recently posted..Amazing Taj Mahal
The cheating was a problem… it drove me crazy sometimes. But it’s true, it’s a problem in so many places. South India is beautiful, I saw some gorgeous places in Tamil Nadu.
Hello, I was surfing about the pros and cons of nose piercing and stumbled upon your article about piercing
.
I am from India and am working in Bangalore.
I really liked the stuff you write here and its quite interesting to know about my country from a foreigner’s perspective. The thing you wrote about the urban cities in India like Delhi, Mumbai etc may be true to a considerable extant. I wonder if you have ever traveled to the East and North-eastern states like West Bengal and Sikkim ?…If you haven’t then you must plan a visit to this part of the country.
I also request you to visit Calcutta (now Kolkata) which was once the British capital of India. With a history of a colonial past, this metro city has been able to preserve its rich culture and heritage…a stark contrast to the other metro cities in India. It is a city that gave birth to many prolific writers especially during the freedom struggle..both in English and Bengali (the local language). The best time to visit would be the month of October when the climate is good and we have the Durga Puja (festival of the goddess) here. Most people understand English here and food is awesome
..please do visit..
Hi Sanchari, thanks for your comment! I haven’t visited Sikkim and West Bengal yet but I would love to go there in the future. I also hear many good things about Kolkata and especially the Durga Puja. This is one part of India I still have to explore…