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Growing up, I never thought about waste lifecycles. I didn’t have to. Our trash was picked up in three separate bins (trash, recycling, and compost) each week, and I was quite comfortable living in ignorance thinking that once the trash was carted away, it just disappeared. In high school, we took a field trip to our local waste management facility. We watched as machines sorted through the different types of recycled materials––paper, aluminum, glass, and various types of plastic. From there recyclable materials were sold to the informal sector while the remaining waste was incinerated, sealed, and buried in a local waste field. The field trip cemented what I should have already known––that nothing just disappears. While burning waste reduces its size significantly, there was still charred contents that had to be put somewhere. We watched as fields were filled with burnt waste and sealed off to reduce the toxic leaching, but we were told that leaching was still likely. That experience, along with a handful of others, were the only times in my life that I put a lot of thought into the lifecycles of waste. I’d like to implore you to consider the lifecycle of your garbage from just this week: the plastic yogurt container, granola bar wrapper, cereal box and plastic lining, the one plastic water bottle you used when you forgot your reusable bottle at home, or whatever seems to accumulate in your trash can. What if your trash wasn’t picked up this week, if it was sporadic, or if it didn’t exist at all. In Kerala, that’s the reality for many people––waste collection is sporadic, and more often, non-existent. Positive Change for Marine Life began operating in Kerala in 2018. They interviewed daily wage earning, coastal community members to determine the organizations starting point. They learned that although the fishing has deteriorated in the last 20 years, and people often run on a deficit during the off season, the biggest problem they face was waste management. They shared that they were living among waste as fishing boats caught plastic in their nets, streets and community centers were full of litter, and no one knew how to manage it. PCFML realized that they could only improve the ocean ecosystem and livelihoods of coastal community members once they solved the problem of waste. I arrived in Kovalam in March. After a few weeks, I wondered what happened to my trash. All I knew was that I sorted it, and that my host family gathered it every few days. After a few weeks, I peered over the ledge in our backyard to see my box of cornflakes, surrounded by plastic wrappers, laying under the canopy of coconut trees. I was mortified. I asked myself how I would think about waste if I peered over the ledge everyday to see every piece of trash I have ever thrown away. My stomach sank further. Over the past few months, I’ve watched people, outside of the PCFML’s waste collection pilot program, deal with their waste. Each evening, I notice plumes of smoke, followed by the repulsive smell of burning plastic. Unlike the facility I visited in high school, there is no mechanism to filter the toxic chemicals that burning trash released, nor a way to seal the waste once it was burned. I’ve remained curious about the physical impact of burning plastic was on the people living here, or how the leaching impacts local terrestrial and marine ecosystems. I write this because personal waste management is a rarity in the US, but a reality in many other parts of the world. People who grew up with formal waste management systems too often hold the romantic idea that waste disappears. It gives us permission to consume and discard frivolously while placing judgement on communities like Kovalam where the beachfront is marred by piles of waste.

Almost 8 months ago, I wrote with a question. How much can you learn about a place in the first 30 minutes after waking? The answer when I first asked that question was a lot. But today, when I forgot to buy eggs, it felt almost nostalgic. As I prepare to leave my apartment for what will almost certainly be the last time, I have realized how familiar I have grown to this place, and the people in and around it. I want to thank them for making the City of Dreams (New Delhi) that at times felt closer to nightmares, feel a little more like home. This morning when I woke up at 7:00 am to the doorbell. I felt thankful to know that Sushma was here, even though I knew she would soon come into my room and ask me what I wanted to eat for the day. Even though I knew I would have to groggily piece together words when the thought of speaking, especially in a language that is still new to me, seemed impossible. When I left the house to go buy eggs, the air felt like fall again. It reminded me of when I first moved into the apartment when everything was new. This time though, as I walked down the street to buy eggs for the last time, I knew that it was time for the children to walk to school. I knew that I had to insert myself into the line of men outside of the little shop. I knew that the grumpy Sardar (what my housemates and I call the shopkeeper) would scowl at me. I knew the dogs would curiously follow me until they became preoccupied. It felt like in no time at all what felt so unfamiliar to me became incredibly ordinary. When I walked up the stairs I brought Sushma the eggs while she ridiculed me for asking for dal chavaal for the last time. When I finished my coffee, I brought my cup into the kitchen where she offered me some tea. We stood facing one another while we sipped slowly and chatted about her trip home, and what I had been doing while she was away. Then I told her I was leaving tomorrow, very early in the morning. Her face fell as she replied something along the lines of "As soon as I come back, you leave." I felt my bottom lip start to tremble. I pulled the cup to my mouth to try to hide the deep sadness I felt as I thought about leaving. I turned my back and pretended to look in the hall, while I wiped the first tears that fell from my eyes. When I turned back, she muttered: “Aap theek hai?” (Are you okay?) My bottom lip trembled uncontrollably as my eyes welled and tears streamed down my face. I couldn’t respond because my voice was shaking so much. “kya hua cate?” (what happened, Cate?) She asked. “Bahut miss karungee, aap” (I will miss you very much) I responded. And she responded the same as she reached out her hands to wipe away my tears. Then she moved her hands to firmly grip my forearms, then back to my face to wipe away more tears. I wanted to express my gratitude so that she could know how deeply her presence impacted my life. She was consistent when I couldn’t even put into words what consistency meant. Saying goodbye to her was one of the hardest things I’ve ever done. I felt confused about why I struggled so much and I think it’s because while she technically worked for me, in so many ways she began to feel like family to me. The City of Dreams taught me that there’s a lot to learn in the first 30 minutes of waking. It taught me to cherish the mundane moments and even the ones of discomfort because specks of beauty so often fall in between.

I’ve always thought that everything happens for a reason and liked the idea that the universe gives me signs. These beliefs allow me to relinquish control in aspects of my life where I have none. In the fall, on my first field visit, I found the corner of a playing card in the street. I took a picture to send to Jules––“thinking of you.” Last year, Jules introduced us to a game she likes to play with her family and friends where one person picks a playing card out of a deck and then another person has to guess the number and suit. Whether the game is pure luck or us tapping a greater energy, I will never know. What I do know for sure is how exhilarating it is when we guess the exact card correctly. I posted the picture of the card on VSCO (my favorite form of social media because I’m really the only one who sees what I post), and it blew up with reposts. I was honestly shocked because it wasn’t a particularly good photo. It felt like the universe was screaming. "PAY ATTENTION". Over the next few months, I started to find playing cards everywhere. I asked my friends on Fulbright if they have ever found playing cards on the streets. I figured that I couldn't be the only one finding cards everywhere. I considered the fact that people play a lot of cards in India and since there isn’t a central waste management system everywhere, when old cards are thrown away, they end up in the streets. “Do you all find playing cards everywhere?” I asked. I received puzzled looks. They were: "Are you crazy? Why would I find playing cards in the street?" looks. "So it's weird right, that I find playing cards everywhere?" I asked. My friends agreed. As the weeks passed by, it wasn't uncommon for me to send unsolicited photos of the cards I found. I found them while I was running around Delhi, on my way to yoga class, on my way to therapy, walking to the metro after my Ayurveda course, once I arrived in Kochi, and when I walked to my Scuba class. I'm sure there were other times too, but these are the most notable. There came a point when I realized that I found playing cards at points when I was doing things that were closely aligned with my identity and sense of self. So it began that whenever I found a playing card, or better yet, a few in one spot, I felt like I was heading in the right direction. This year has challenged my intuition more than any other time in my life. No part of my Fulbright experience has been what I expected it to be. I've failed more here than I have in any other part of my life, and funks like that caused me to lose the trust in my sixth sense. Finding cards helped me regain my lost intuition. They seemed to remind me that even though life, growth, and success look different here, that doesn't mean I'm doing anything wrong. The cards reinforced what I already knew: that I can and should trust my gut because, for the most part, it will lead me in the right direction. When I felt a strong urge to be near the ocean in January, I didn't question it. The ocean grounds me in a way that no other part of nature does. Largely, the ocean is home to me, and I think that while living through such a turbulent time in my life, I needed the ocean to ground me. I reached out to a few marine conservation organizations to learn more about their work. My goal was to see if I could connect my initial research proposal to marine conservation––it was a stretch, I know. For a few weeks, I didn’t find any leads. I had a few phone calls and email chains, but none of the organizations that I spoke to had what I was looking for––that is until I received an email from Positive Change for Marine Life. Long story, short, I visited their Kovalam operation a few weeks back to shadow the implementation of their fisheries monitoring program. When reached the field site, I looked down at my feet to see a playing card. I smiled, relieved, and felt the tension that I didn't know I was carrying in my shoulders release. I reached down to pick the card up and noticed another. After another second, I realized that there were playing cards everywhere. It felt like someone screamed "52 PICKUP" and threw an entire deck of cards in the air that were now peacefully strewn all over the ground. I was awe-struck. It felt kismet, like the cards were leading me here. After months of feeling like I was in free fall, with no direction, playing cards served as a guide that led me exactly where I needed to be. Since then, I couldn't believe how easily everything fell into place. I found a great place to live, a community of motivated people to work with everyday, another outlet to pursue my research, and a place that I can slowly begin to build a home. My arrival here was a few weeks ago, now. I thought about how I hadn’t found any cards since then. Just like that, on a run, I looked down and saw two cards. A coincidence? Maybe, but I thought of those cards as another reminder that I am exactly where I need to be. This post has largely been rooted in my aptitude for spirituality, but if that doesn't resonate with you, the cards can also be seen as reflection points. They give me the space to consider how I am spending my time, the decisions I have made and the ones I have yet to make. When I don’t find playing cards now, I notice and think about what I need to do to get back on track i.e. find more cards. Playing cards have been my stepping stones, and I encourage anyone reading to find whatever that is for you. Those little things that you see, notice, or hear, that seem to whisper “notice me” because maybe those will prove to be your stepping stones––leading you to exactly where you need to go.

I read Eat, Pray, Love at the beginning of this year. My evaluation of that book is outside of the scope of this blog post (I have been reading too much scholarly literature jargon, yikes), but I refer to portions of that book a lot when I think about my experience this year. I have always liked finding running themes during periods of my life. In college, I found threads in my classes that ran transcended my personal life, but this year, I’ve had to find them on my own. My current chapter, or maybe the one that I am just leaving behind is called learning how to breathe. It seems like an oxymoron because everyone knows how to breathe. What I realized only recently, is how formative the breath is for my mind, body, and soul. I’ll try to tell you exactly what I mean. I’ve never been able to meditate because my body and mind are constantly in motion. During my third yoga class, Seema (my yoga teacher in Delhi) told us that we were to lie down, motionless for 10 minutes. My internal alarm bells sounded and I felt panicked at the thought of laying still. In those moments I thought of Eat, Pray, Love. At the end of her time in India, Elizabeth went to meditate. She found a spot overlooking a lake and began her practice. A few moments later, mosquitoes surrounded her. Instead of moving to another location, Elizabeth decided to notice the mosquitos and then simply return to her breath. When I first read that part of the book, I was appalled at how masochistic she seemed. That was six months ago. Looking back, I admire her ability to notice discomfort, sit with it, and let her breath guide her back to the present. In the 10 minutes of meditation in the climate-controlled studio, thinking of the alternative of being eaten alive by mosquitoes, I sat still. After weeks of yoga and hour-long stints of shavasana, I left the studio and let my feet carry me through the streets slowly and gave my mind permission to relax. A few weeks later, I decided to get my Open Water Scuba Certification. It’s something I have always wanted to try; I figured, if not now, then when? I thought scuba diving would be easy. What’s so hard about breathing underwater? My first few breaths underwater were panic-inducing. I don’t like to feel out of control, and for as long as I can remember, water has made me feel that way. I didn’t like jumping into water, I didn’t like going underwater, and I was never the strongest swimmer. I forgot how it felt to put my head underwater––I hadn’t been swimming in almost 7 months. We started yesterday with snorkelling. I held onto the railing, with my face in the water and kicked and breathed. I know, easy. But for me, the panic that sometimes accompanies putting my head underwater sets in. As I was kicking in the pool, internally, I was freaking out. I hated the sounds underwater. I hated the way my ears felt and how I couldn’t see through the murky pool water. I remembered why I’ve avoided water for so long. It’s funny, really. I love it; I feel more drawn to the ocean than any other part of nature, but it also involves a unique sense of fear. I didn’t want to be underwater anymore. It brought me so much fear and anxiety and when we left the pool and started diving, I felt the pressure in my ears change and the lack of oxygen and sometimes a bit of water if I tried to breathe in through my nose. To become a PADI certified Open Water Diver, students must demonstrate their ability to breathe underwater, without a mask on, for a minute, put their mask back on, and clear the water out. The first time I took my mask off and tried to breathe through my second stage (the part of your scuba equipment that you breathe through), I choked relentlessly. I felt embarrassed and anxious because it seemed as though every time I tried, water would enter my nose and cause uncontrollable choking. I had no idea how I was going to do it without choking, and much less how I would do it in a place where I didn’t have the open air as a safety net if I choked. My instructor told me that it was okay to take it slow. He told me that he didn’t even know how to swim when he started diving. He empathized with my panic in the water and reassured me that it was okay to take time to learn how to breathe without my mask. He simply told me to keep practicing. I began by holding my nose as I breathed in, then let go to exhale. Once I felt comfortable, I unblocked my nose. If I was very calm, and only thought about breathing I didn’t choke, but when the time came to put my mast back on, I felt a flurry of fear rush over me followed by water going straight up my nose. I frantically stood up, choking away, and doubting that I would end the week with a certification. I forgot that you can learn though. Before going to yoga I thought that I was always going to have trouble with my flexibility or balancing positions. The notion of progress wasn’t one I could conceptualize because it’s been a long time since I’ve learned to do anything that I was once very bad at. When we leave childhood, I think we forget that we can learn new skills. I was never bad at anything, and the things that I was bad at, I don’t really remember learning. Trying something new and being bad at it, has caused me to completely give up on things without giving them another try. Internally I say, well, I guess I just wasn’t meant for this and that has to be fine. On the last day of my scuba class, I took off my mask at 10 meters underwater. I relaxed and channelled myself in shavasana, completely focused on my breath, using it to calm down my panic response and breathe in through my mouth and out through my nose for one minute. Before I knew it, my instructor tapped me to put my mask back on. I waited, breathed, and then slowly and methodically (two words I never thought I would use to describe anything I have or will ever do) put my mask back on, cleared it, and gave my instructor a high five. Learning how to breathe––to follow your breath and focus on how the air feels as it moves in and out of your body. I learned the power of breath at first in yoga when I learned to sit still and resist the urge to move. I learned it again when I learned to scuba dive when I learned to breathe in through my mouth and out through my nose. But these lessons in breath revealed a more prominent thread that I will carry with me––learning how to breathe taught me that I am capable of learning. It taught me to be patient with myself, and it gave me the confidence to continually challenge my perception of my capabilities.

“It looks like you found your joy” Supriya said as I ran back up to her after I skipped through the sand at the beach. She was right. I found my joy. No surprise to me I found it in a place that reminded me so much of where I grew up—with the sound of waves crashing on the shore and the wind coursing through my sea salted and quite frankly, sandy hair. Finding joy means different things throughout the course of our lives, but this year has been the first time joy hasn’t simply fallen into my lap—I’ve had to fight for joy. It’s an arduous fight too, but in moments where I’ve found it, hidden in plain sight on the beaches of Goa, or in the little boy’s smile when I let him keep the extra 5 rupees change–– “aap kay liye” (for you)––from the fruit I buy on the side of the road when I walk to the metro from class, I am so grateful that I kept fighting.

There is a cartoonist who used simple and elegant lines to depict closeness of relationships throughout a person’s life. I first saw it a few years ago, but I remember thinking how beautiful it was that she was able to boil down the complexities of relationships into lines. The beauty that I found in it was also heartbreaking––because when we are surrounded by people who seem so pivotal to our existence, we might not realize the moment when our paths begin to veer away from one another; it’s only in hind site that we notice how far away they are. Over the past few years, I have begun to come to terms with the fact that I won’t be friends with everyone forever. I understand that people come into our lives for various reasons, and that I can be thankful for the impact that they had, without lamenting the fact that we aren’t friends anymore. I do think there is something to be said for the people who stick around. Those who mirror and challenge the growth that I experience. Whenever I returned home from college for breaks, I felt a lot of self loathing for my inability to connect with all the people I once considered my closest friends. It took me a long time to admit that I wasn’t the same person that I was in high school despite feeling like I had to fit the same mold. Realistically, I had far outgrown that mold. Just like putting on a pair of jeans that’s far too tight, even if you can button them, they’re going to make you absolutely miserable the entire time you’re wearing them. My time in India has been nothing short of extraordinary in every sense of that work––the good, the bad, and the ugly. This is to say that I’m not the same person that I was when I graduated from college, nor the same person as when I frantically threw my bags onto the weight at Logan Airports check-in counter, through muffled tears as I said goodbye to Kiernan. I’m not the same person as when I got here and stayed in the hotel, nor the same as when I first moved into my apartment. The reality is that with so much uncertainty and stimulation every single day, my sense of self changes dramatically from one day to the next. I have found that my flexibility and accommodation for the unplanned and unknown is far greater than it ever has been––I attribute this solely my forced adherence to utter uncertainty. Because nothing is the same here. The things that I thought would be the most challenging, I can do with ease and those that I thought would be easiest pose the most challenges. When you wake up and walk down your street every single day to see families sleeping on cement sidewalks under a haze of air pollution while you fall asleep on the second floor to the hum of your air purifier, when you walk into a train station with a backpacking backpack and a day pack full of everything you’ll need for the next two months, and look around to realize that everyone around you has the clothes on their back and maybe a little something on the side, you gain a lot of perspective. Because poverty is never pretty. In the US, we glorify poverty. A lot. Poverty can tear at our heartstrings and make us question our life choices, but it’s never pretty. I ran a half marathon a month ago. I ran it because I wanted to run far outside––it seems like a simple pleasure that could be afforded to me nearly anywhere. In Delhi, that wasn’t a realistic expectation. Running the half marathon isn’t the point though. The point is that when you run a half marathon, the organizers give out goodie bags with food and souvenirs. When I exited the gates of the stadium, small children swarmed, begging for food. I counted at least twenty of them pulling at my clothing. I didn’t need the food or the juice, or really anything in the gift bag. One by one, I pulled out fruits and juice boxes, and handed them out. When I had nothing left, because those bags are only meant for one person, the children kept begging. This is what I mean when I say that poverty is never pretty. I had nothing left to give. I quite literally carried my cell phone and the clothes on my back. They kept pulling at me, begging for more that I simply didn’t have. In a rush of guilt and frustration I grew angry at the children for their inability to recognize that I didn’t have anything left. I was angry with a world that has propelled poverty cycles that children are born into––because it's not their fault either, nor their parents. I angrily said peeche chordo which essentially means go away or drop it and pushed through the crowd of begging hands that quickly swarmed runner after runner who exited the stadium. After that I was emotionally distraught. No matter how much a person gives here and to whom, it’s never enough. In the most populated city in the world, there will still be another child, at the next corner and they will ask you for more money. When you have to grapple with that kind of poverty and simultaneously understand your privilege in it, mundane problems, or “three car garage problems” as my friends and I sometimes call them, seem really small. I want to emphasize that I’m not saying that we should all understand what it’s like to sleep on the streets of Delhi, rather that being bombarded by seemingly endless gentrification and wealth disparity can be debilitating and confusing. These compounded with the language barrier, the cultural nuances that make it challenging to connect with people, and several other parts of living here gave me a new perspective. This is all to say that it seems extraordinary to find people who grow in parallel to us. Who allow us to grow through the molds that no longer suit us and reveal the beauty that can accompany movement through each iteration of our comfort zones.

October began with Leh and learning to stand up for myself. It was Jaipur with Laila and Adam and the wedding. It was Diwali and the worst Diwali party of all time. It was recognizing that not all challenges are worth overcoming and choosing your battles because taking them all on would be impossible. It was learning to care for myself in the best ways I could and recognizing times that brought me energy and times that didn't. It was looking to the future and making sure that the girl that I become doesn't have to endure the same obstacles again. It was giving myself grace as if I were one of my sisters, or anyone else in my life really. Finally, it was the double take Laila and I got in Nature's Asshole (our unique nickname for the overprice, posh, and quite lovely organic store Nature's Soul). It probably wasn't the worst Diwali party of all time, but that's how Laila and I retrospectively refer to this night. It was the night that we decided that we would never again stay somewhere we didn't want to be. The rest of Diwali, I should add, was very fun. I've never celebrated Diwali, but I loved watching the fireworks from the rooftop and eating good food with new people. I took a trip to Leh, Ladakh at the beginning of October. I knew that I needed to reconnect with nature after being surrounded by a city that, even after a month seemed so foreign to me. I remember walking through the city of Leh a dorky grin and tears streaming down my face. It was the first time in India where I felt at home. I've always felt that way in the mountains, although I never realize how much I need to reconnect with that part of myself until it's been missing for a little bit too long. We set out to trek from Chilling to Stok for the weekend. It was ambitious. Halfway through the hike, where the picture on the left was taken, was at 16,000 feet with a 20 kg pack, and some wobbly legs, the steps up and over that pass were quite possible the hardest steps I've ever taken. When we returned from the mountains we were greeted with loads of chai, delicious Tibetan food, and for me, an itch to get back to those mountains as soon as humanly possible. Laila and I met Adam in Jaipur a month after orientation. When I saw Adam in the airport I ran up and gave him a huge hug. It felt like seeing an old friend from home. The familiarity that I felt when we were all together was phenomenal. That night, we stayed up exchanging stories from our first month. We shared challenges, victories, and for myself at least, validation for getting to this point. The rest of that week, we explored Jaipur. We went to Amer Fort, shopped for antique silver in an alleyway off the main street. There we were surrounded by women exchanging their old jewelry. We all sat together on a carpet next to a glass full of old silver, searching through to find pieces that we wanted to take home. I loved Jaipur. Not just for the people I was with, but for the livelihood and creativity of the city. It was everywhere. The architecture brought the history of the state of Rajasthan to life in a way that preserves the culture despite the passage of time. When we returned from Jaipur, I developed a full body rash and had to get a blood test. Unbeknownst to me, blood tests take place at your home! The morning of my blood test, I asked where it was. To that my housemate giggled and told me that they were coming to our apartment. What?! I tried to picture it occurring. Where it would be, and what equipment he would bring. I tracked him like an uber eats delivery as he got closer. I was confused because the icon was a motorbike. There was no way he was on a motorbike, I thought. When he rang the bell, I was still in shock that this was happening here. I opened the door to see the man who was to take my blood, with a large backpack riding low on his back, like I used to wear it in middle school when my mom told me I was going to have back problems for wearing it like that, but it was cool. He also carried a motor cycle helmet. He directed himself into the dining room where he instructed me to sit down, while he did the same. He then rifled through his backpack for all of his materials. As he pulled out the syringes and vials for my blood, it reminded me of my grandma pulling out old candy from the bottom of her purse. He mine as well have blown on them like she always did––to get rid of the lint that had accumulated over time. I took a deep breath and placed my arm on the table. I closed my eyes stuck me with the needle on top of the same table where I had just eaten breakfast––how bizarre. And as soon as he came, he tossed everything back into his bag and left. I still wonder if that really even happened. I guess I have pictures to prove it. A week later, I was mostly recovered. I ran the Delhi Half marathon, where Laila met me at the end. We ate a celebratory breakfast afterward. I was just thankful for the opportunity to run a long distance outside. It's the little things. The wedding.

August was spent in the ambassador, anxiously awaiting the life that I was about to begin. It was a time when outfits were chosen with the assurance that the day would end with them drenched in sweat. It was an overload of stimuli and emotions. It was settling in and convincing myself that this was the right choice. It was no hunger all day because of the heat, followed by ravenous hunger at night. August was transition, learning and relearning, while September was meeting myself in a new place.It was deciding who I wanted to be and how I wanted to spend my time. It was excitement for the future and beginning to envision a life here that was mine. Laila and I began our journey as lone 2022-2023 Fulbrighters in Delhi with an extended stay at the Ambassador Hotel. During that time, we braved the city and learned that absolutely nothing in this city is what we thought it would be. No one told us that we were going to have roommates during orientation, so imagine my surprise to arrive at my hotel room door, unlocked the door, and found that it was chained shut. Laila woke up from what I can only imagine was a light sleep, to unchain the door and let me in. I awkwardly tried to grab my bag from the man who helped me bring it upstairs, but he insisted on carrying it all the way into the room––it was heavy so I didn't mind. The culture shock was coupled with the extreme heat that we felt on an everyday basis. It was over 100 degrees farneheit with a 60% + humidity everyday. There were points during that week and a half where I had to pack extra clothes for our daily outings because I was sweating so much upon exiting any air conditioned building. Orientation. After three days, it's safe to say that I didn't feel oriented at all. I was jetlagged, confused, and a little homesick. I think that we all felt that way though. I'm thankful that I managed to make some friends during this turbulent transition period. My birthday. Everyone always asks you if you feel older on your birthday. for twenty-two years, I responded a resounding "no" or an inauthentic "yes." But twenty-three was different. I woke on my birthday a different person than when I fell asleep that night. It was the first day that I took an auto-rickshaw by myself. I was terrified. Everyone told me not to travel alone. Anywhere. While there were helpful parts of our orientation, I felt like a lot of it was simply for liability purposes. Instead of outlying the risks of living in this city and pointing to facts about safety here, they simply told us what we should and shouldn't do. Binary guidelines were not only unrealistic, but they also didn't give us the necessary information to act in accordance to our own risk tolerances. I learned quickly, however, that I could indeed take an auto alone, and because I had to tour the apartment, I did. I met my current landlord (pictured on the bottom right) and toured the apartment that I now live in. Upon my return to orientation, my entire cohort sang me happy birthday and brought out a cake. I was mortified. I don't like getting a lot of attention and I didn't want anyone to think that I was self centered and needed the day to be all about me. In my head, I counted twenty-three years without much thought or expectation, because I knew I would have so much trouble if I set expectations in a place with so much uncertainty and where I wasn't close with anyone. After cake, a group of us decided to see a mosque and a market. Little did I know how formative my first and as of now, only visit to Chandi Chowk would be. When I tell people now, two months later, that I visited Chandi Chowk on my third day in Delhi, their jaws drop. There were more people in that part of the city than I have ever seen before in my entire life. Culture shock doesn't do those feelings justice––enamored, overwhelmed, and perspective are the words that come to mind when I look back on that experience. If you know anything about me, you know that I tend to do things at the last minute. Before I left for India, I lost my debit card... Everything happens in cash here, which was such a foreign concept to me as in America, we are rapidly transitioning away from cash. To pay my deposit and first months rent, I needed to take out cash. Luckily, my mom found a convenient loophole, or so we thought. She used a wire to transfer me the money that I needed. We both thought it was a brilliant idea and that it would be seamlessly executed, but that, unfortunately wasn't the case. After two days of leapfrogging through the city, to a total of twelve banks, we found someone who could complete the transfer. He sat inside the shop pictured, at a tiny desk that he pulled out to reveal a bench where we sat. While he counted out the money for us, I snuck a selfie of Laila and I, soaking up the humidity and ambiance of the last place I ever thought I would have picked up a wire transfer from my lovely mother who answered my panicked calls in the middle of the night (her time) asking her to please call the bank and tell them that it is in deed me picking up the money and not a scammer. Our search for the perfect coffee shop. Spoiler alert: we didn't find it. Laila and I knew that for the duration of our fellowship we would be conducting literature reviews, analyzing data, and writing about our findings. While both of us have the luxury to go to our universities, we wanted to find another place to do work that brought us some semblance of normalcy. While the photos of this beautifully aesthetic coffee shop seem like the perfect place to sit and work, remember that looks can be deceiving. The shop was full of loud conversation from opening to close, resulting in an environment that wasn't conducive to our focus efforts. It took me a month to find the coffee shop I was looking for. When I finally did, I felt like I won the lottery.

How much can you really learn about a place in the first thirty minutes of waking up? The answer is more the longer that I stay here. This morning I awoke at 6:00 am to the sound of the mosque calling the community to prayer. Can you imagine if every single day the way that you wake up isn’t because of an alarm, rather, a speaker that sounds telling you and the rest of the community that it’s time to wake up––“ootna”? I opened my eyes to see the shade that I drew open the night prior to make sure that I would see the sunlight as the night changed to morning. Waking up to the sun is my favorite thing––some people love when rooms are pitch dark, but for me the most important aspect of any room is truly the natural light. When the alarm sounded this morning, I was disheveled and also surprised to see that at 6:00 am it was still pitch dark out. Three of us had plans to go for a walk. Shortly after I opened my eyes, I heard a knock on my door. In a daze, I muttered “ek second, ek second” as I pulled on a pair of pants, slipped my hood over my head and headed out the door. It was a hazy morning––the dew and smoke from the stubble burnings hung shallow in the air. We exchanged few words as we made our way through the streets. I was surprised to see so many people beginning their days. Some began to take the shutters off of their shops, a few women huddles around a fire, with a table flipped on its side to shelter then from the breeze “havaa”. As we meandered down the street, it was refreshing to see few people as they begun their days. In the first moments after waking, we were all in the same subtle fog, reminding ourselves of where we left our feet as our minds wandered off in sleep. At one point, I heard a horn, honking constantly––I watched as a bus approached us, continuing to honk its horn. Instead of slowing in the presence of people, like a train barreling toward us, it rushed past––leaving us in it’s wake as the wind wiped through my hair in a flurry and then past––almost like the bus never passed through at all. Because in many ways it didn’t––it brushed the corners of this place, but wouldn’t even slow to peer out at the life that’s goes on here. How much can you really learn about a place––the answer is a lot––as I sit here and watch Arun fill his pen with ink because here you just refill pens I guess instead of buying new ones. How innovative.

Yesterday I did my first field visit. A few days ago, Laila’s dad asked her how she is going to use the next two weeks before she goes home. While the comment wasn’t directed toward me. It sparked a set of questions in my own mind about the best ways to utilize the time I have in India and how to take advantage of the opportunity that I have to be here. I think that I’ve felt guilty about the last two weeks in that I haven’t done very much outside of the walls of the places where I have stayed. I’ve continued taking language classes, talked to friends from home, read, and written more than I have since I’ve been here. I think that there can be space for these activities and that there should be, but it comes at the cost of my own guilt for not exploring the spaces around me more. That guilt is something that I am working through, but for now, it seems to be a constant when my life lacks the structure I normally rely on. What can I do here that I can’t do anywhere else in the world? I did, what my parents would describe as dialing for dollars. I compiled a list of my social enterprise contacts around India and sent out introduction emails with requests for informational interviews. Since I’ve been here, I’ve had to release the chokehold that plans previously had on me. Spontaneity is not something that I take on easily. The way I see plans in my brain are cemented. If I think that something is going to happen, it will––despite how it impacts the people around me or if my better judgement has anything to do with it. One easy example of this is if I tell myself I’m going to run one day. It’s now subconscious, but if I tell myself I’m going to run, somehow, someway, I will run. In college, I cancelled plans or showed up late to things because I told myself I had to run, study, or what have you. No matter what it was, if I had something in my head that had to happen, it would. Here, I planned to stay in Delhi. To stick it out until the end of the year no matter how challenging it was. That is, until I travelled to the mountains, and realized that I didn’t have to be constrained by the previous notions that I had about how the year was going to be for me. I realized that just because living there was challenging, I didn’t have to stick it out. I grew up thinking that challenges were always meant to be overcome. If something challenged me, I learned the importance of sticking it out––this year, however, I have been allotted more freedom to learn and grow. I questioned what the point was of staying in a place that crushed the excitement I had about my research. So, when I left Delhi, I read, I actually read. For the first time since I’ve been here. I wrote. I called people who I missed. I studied Hindi outside of class with genuine passion. I did work on my research. I thought critically about my actual interests. I didn’t do any of that in Delhi. But I still felt guilty for leaving, even though I was more productive and engaged in my work. I still have doubts about leaving, but when I look at a notebook full of thoughts from each day over the past two weeks, I’m trying to feel proud of myself for shifting out of the groove that I was in, onto something that has the potential to bring tangible progress. I’ve learned that not doing anything––in terms of changing your situation is far easier than changing. Shifting, although we like to perpetuate the narrative that it’s easy––no part of it is. So, I cold-emailed. I reached out to a company called The Goat Trust. It’s a company that works with women in rural villages within 60 km of Lucknow, where I am currently based. They train women to be Pashu Sakhis. A Pashu Sakhi functions like a low-level veterinarian. They are trained to treat symptoms rather than understand the functions of the animal as a whole. This model of training is very important because many villages don’t have access, and certainly don’t have easy access to veterinarians when goats get sick, which can lead to the loss of many goats in need of treatment. Their business model is innovative, in that it gives women a very specialized skillset, without the burden in terms of cost and time, of many years of school. While the Goat Trust and the Pashu Sakhis are involved in many more activities, for ease of understanding, that’s as far as I will explain for now. Yesterday, I got to visit the field. The day prior, I bought a pink kurta. A kurta is a long shirt that many people in India wear daily. Women in villages don’t wear any western clothing––unlike in populated cities––even there, many women still wear traditional Indian clothing. I stand out already, so I figured for my own comfort and to respect local customs, I would wear a kurta. As I drove further from the city, I saw the forests around me become dense. I saw crops growing in fields that spanned in every direction. I often feel relief when I leave the city. I think that it’s because I grew up in a rural place, where there was more green than buildings. Cities tend to make me feel like I am being suffocated. When I saw miles and miles of green, I finally felt like I could breathe. Like the weight on my chest was being lifted. When we arrived at the office, it seemed like everyone was staring at me. This is something that I’ve gotten used to, but this time it didn’t feel threatening. It was mostly just curiosity. We sat down with the person who runs the operation in Uttar Pradesh and I was told to ask him questions about what he does. I felt unprepared for this conversation. I didn’t have many questions. I didn’t have many that I could ask in Hindi and I just kind of froze with all of the attention and overstimulation from being in a new place. This continued happening at each village we went to after. I was supposed to ask questions and I didn’t even know what to ask, especially not in Hindi. There was one boy who I thought was cool––Suraj. It’s not often that I come by people who I like, but he treated me like a normal person, instead of a foreigner. I was inspired by the way that he spoke to the women in the villages as if he was friends with them. It was clear that he had taken the time to make a connection with them and learn about the intricacies of their lives. He made jokes with them and asked them questions that got to the heart of the stories that they were trying to tell. That first day was tough because of the language barrier. I spent the entire time trying to decipher what people were saying and then thinking of the best ways to respond. I find that at the end of days when I have to speak a lot of Hindi, my brain just turns off––that is until I actually have to respond. I think that the most learning has come from those moments––where I just want to be done. The moments where I wish I could dissolve into a pile of goop and be slowly pushed aside. When I am forced to respond, however, my brain goes into overdrive and comes up with answers that I didn’t even know I could conjure. In the car on the ride home, the driver wanted to chat away. I don’t know why the tail end of the day was the time when he decided that he finally wanted to chat, but he did. We talked about our lives and what we like to do for fun. He told me about his 6 siblings and that he wanted to learn English to be able to read the street signs. It was nice to have him in the front seat and me in the back because I felt less pressure to respond immediately. I took my time understanding and responding. It felt like I was having a real conversation and not just one where I was using regurgitated sentences that I had learned over the past two months. There was a point where I didn’t know what else to ask, but in time, I will learn more and be able to continue. I then thought about Arun and my conversation about social enterprises and their impact on rural villages. We talked about the fact that people in the villages that we visited think of life much differently than people in cities. They live for survival. They don’t get to think about the future nor do they have many hopes and dreams past the present moment. Their life is centred within the village––centuries it seems away from life anywhere else. When we talked about COVID, I realized that it wasn’t a reality that they faced there like everywhere else in the world––they did experience economic hardship and mass starvation. During the third COVID wave that India experienced, many people also got sick. But it didn’t impact them in the same way because there was no way of transmitting information to them. Smartphones in those villages are new, and before that, there wasn’t a real means of decimating information. They saw COVID at face value: economic hardship, starvation, and sickness. As the week went on and I continued to visit villages, I noticed lines of children outside the doors. They stumbled over one another giggling as I smiled at them from where I was sitting. They were shy and cute and simply shocked to see a white person with blond hair enter their home. My favorite conversations were the ones that I had with the children. They were patient with me as I stumbled through questions about their lives and tried to learn more about their perspective on the world. The reality is that those children are the future. Adults’ perceptions of the world and their lives are hard to change, while children’s views are malleable. The Goat Trust has the opportunity and is beginning to teach children, especially young girls all that is possible for their futures. Girls are shown that there is potential for them to earn an income for their families and how to be the face of growth and change within their communities. Growing up, I was always told that children are the future, but it didn’t resonate with me until I met the children in the villages where the Goat Trust works, or until I met the girls who were inspired by the work that their mothers and aunties do to earn money. Children will make the changes needed to improve the quality of life for all people––but it's the role models who have to teach them unless they will continue to make the same mistakes of their parents and perpetuated cycles of poverty that exist in the world.

There's a man with a turban wrapped around his head walking by wearing all brown. There are two boys sitting outside chatting. One is sitting on a motorcycle while the other stands beside him. There are chickens huddled together in a small coop beside three bicycles under the shade of a eucalyptus tree. Every so often a scooter passes by, but there's less honking here. The streets would seem busy at home in America, but in India this place is methodical rather than chaotic. That is to say that life goes on with purpose––neither rushed nor lackadaisical, naturally. The man sewing presses his foot against the petal rhythmically––forcing the sewing machine to churn. He's young and tall. When he stands I notice the beautifully printed kurta draped over his shoulder. He walks outside every few minutes to spit on the sidewalk before returning back inside to his sewing. Clothes hang to dry for as far as the eye can see––blowing colors gently on the wind. Rooftops sit stoic––unchanging with each passing day because time moves slowly here. It gives pause to let life simmer.