An Unforgettable Summer: This is How a Heart Breaks

5/17/10

Location: Delhi, India

A heart can break in several ways. A heart can break after losing a loved one, whether it’s from a long-fought lost battle with disease like cancer or a tragic car accident. Someone we loved deeply was taken from our life, and it hurts. We feel it in our chest; we’re heartbroken. A heart can break after breaking up with a boyfriend or girlfriend or divorcing a spouse. Someone we loved deeply left our life, or at least they’ve left the capacity they once filled. It could be their fault, or yours, or just a compilation of circumstances or even fate. But it still hurts, and we feel the ache in our chest; we’re heartbroken. A heart can break out of empathy, by witnessing the mistreatment of other humans or animals. Something we care about deeply is being wronged, and it hurts to see the injustice, discrimination, or abuse. It’s seems not ethically or morally right and unfair, and our chest pangs with sadness and frustration; we’re heartbroken. This way is the closest way I can describe how I felt on my first full day in India, but it’s not quite right.

I don’t know how to describe how I felt when I visited the Jama Masjid mosque in Delhi with the group. I remember that when we arrived, our tour guide told us we would be followed by beggars and other people hawking goods. I wore my dark sunglasses so my eyes couldn’t be seen and tried to mentally prepare how to ignore them—it’s not a good idea to give money to one of them because then it creates a frenzy and they become more relentless. I didn’t bring anything in but my camera and a bottle of water.

We had to take off our shoes outside the mosque and all of the girls had to slip on long cotton gowns over our clothes before entering. I wore one that was a golden yellow with white flowers. The Jama mosque is made primarily of red sandstone and it was very hot on your feet, but they had thin, long, gray mats that crisscrossed the floor to walk on. The Jama mosque is the best-known mosque in India. It was completed in 1656 by the Mughal emperor Shah Jahan, who also commissioned the Taj Mahal. We were walking across one of the mats to the opposite side of the mosque so we could sit in the shade while our tour guide told us about the mosque. Several children approached our group, holding up their hands for money. One boy stopped right next to me. He was wearing bubblegum pink shorts with a white stripe down the side that were more like capris on his small legs, and a striped polo shirt in shades of blue that was three sizes too big for him. His black hair was matted against his head and his feet were gray with dust. He looked at me, and his big chocolate eyes went straight through my sunglasses to my heart, as he said, “Rupees?” and tentatively lifted his hand. I helplessly shook my head no; I didn’t even have any rupees with me. I showed him my empty hands and his eyes fell.

I know I didn’t have any money on me, and I know that even if I did, I couldn’t give money to him without giving money to all of the children at the mosque. Then, I would more than likely be pursued by all the hawkers surrounding the mosque with their bangles and purses, too. But that didn’t make me feel any better, and it was absolutely heartbreaking to see how that little boy lived compared to how I do. After leaving the Jama mosque, we took a bus tour of Delhi and I got to see New Delhi and Old Delhi, and it was clear that the little boy at the mosque was not at all in the minority and there are thousands of other children just like him. It’s both a helpless and frustrating feeling to know that so many children, in India and other places around the world, including the US, aren’t growing up with all of the food, clothes, and toys like I did. They’re growing up with practically nothing. I don’t know the little boy at the mosque’s life specifically, but just by looking at him I could tell that he doesn’t get enough to eat and he hasn’t had a shower in days. I felt helpless because even if I did have rupees with me and gave some to him and to all of the children I saw in the mosque, there would never be enough money to provide for all of the impoverished children in the world. Like I said in my last entry, you see this on the news and you know about it, but seeing their faces and the slums in person makes it a hell of a lot more real. The image of that boy’s eyes, so filled with hope that I, a white girl from a place he’s likely never to see, could help him, will never leave my mind.

Our city tour of Delhi gave us a front row seat to the crumbling buildings, small vendors with Pepsi and Coke signs with outdated logos, the huts and makeshift tents some people call home, the bicycles and rickshaws, and so many people: men in long, straight-leg pants and button-down shirts, women in colorful suits and saris, and children in all sorts of clothing. But we also saw a lot of New Delhi, the new city, which is home to the government offices and wealthier neighborhoods. We saw the India gate, which is a memorial to Indian soldiers who fought for the British in WWI, as well as the embassy buildings and the office of Parliament.

After our city tour, we drove to Qutb Minar, which is the world’s tallest free standing minaret. Three hundred seventy-nine steps lead to the top, but the stairs are closed to everyone, The red-brick and marble minaret and the surrounding complex is so expansive and almost every inch of the minaret, and the columns, walls, and archways in the buildings around it are heavily detailed. Everything looks so rich and ornate, and I couldn’t help by wonder as we explored it with our tour guide what it might have looked like when it was new. It was new over 800 years ago, as the project was started in 1193 by Qutbuddin Aibak of the Mamluk dynasty and finished by his successors. The quality of the architecture that many years ago was amazing to me—there were no computers or much for surveying technology then, but everything is perfectly symmetrical and as I said before, highly precise in its detail.

Next, we had lunch at a restaurant that served Indian, Italian, and Chinese cuisine, so virtually anyone could find something they liked there. I haven’t had pasta since I was in the US, so I had the farfalle pasta with chicken, ham, and alfredo and asagio sauce, and it was excellent, just what I was craving! After lunch, we had the long bus drive from Delhi to our next stop in India, Agra, home of the Taj Mahal. The drive took five hours, and by the time we got to the hotel, we were tired as usual! Some of the group had a light dinner at our hotel’s rooftop terrace grill, which was fully equipped to keep us cool with fans and misters that spread cool, damp air throughout the restaurant. After my combo of soup and a sex on the beach cocktail, it was time for bed.

So far, India has been a lot more eye-opening and thought-provoking than the other countries. New Zealand, Australia, and even Hong Kong were much more similar to home and while we are traveling on a May seminar and I am definitely learning so much every step of the way, those countries felt a little more like a vacation. We were always staying in nice hotels, going on fun excursions and adventures, and writing in our journals about how amazing everything we saw and did was. Here, it’s a more sobering. The thing is, we’re still doing the same things I listed. But when you’re nestled in your clean bed in your large air-conditioned hotel room and you know that just beyond the wall surrounding the hotel are slums and garbage for as far as you can see, you don’t feel so comfortable.