Quite A Wonderful Day

Well, I sure as hell did not do any shopping today nor did I get much work done. At this rate, this break would seem like a total waste of time, if not for the meet-ups I have had with people and the little on and off cooking I have done. That is not quite the break I wanted or envisioned, it is most definitely not the kind of productive I wanted it to be. But I am not going to beat myself over that, I guess. It is a pit too deep, one I have had multiple experiences falling into. And in all of those experiences, finding the way back up the surface from that pit is an all-new ball game altogether, one I don’t want to be playing, especially since my mental state is probably at a much better state than it has been a long time. I am in a great mood even now because I met up with two of my friends after a long while and we went out for dinner, we went to three different places, eating different things everywhere and it was delicious food, great company, and extremely cost-effective. In short, it was my ideal date.

I will be travelling tomorrow morning, my train is at 6am and that means that I have to wake up at 4:30. That means that I shall have to sleep by now so I get a decent amount of sleep. I need that quite desperately. It also means that I get to charge my phone and other gadgets tonight so that I am not stuck in the station without my gadgets. I also need to figure out what to wear for the train journey because it is going to be hot (even though I am travelling in an AC compartment), so there’s quite a lot of logistics I have to work out. I also had to pack, but packing this time genuinely did not take more than 15/20 minutes. I think, overall, my packing skills have increased. I still hate to do it, because it means work but I am much faster and precise about it. For me, that’s a great thing to feel proud of. Well, of course, I still have some last minute things I shall be chucking into my bag tomorrow morning, but that’s the whole point. It is for tomorrow morning, not tonight and so I can leave those worries aside for the moment.

I also put myself mehendi today–mehendi is something I have always loved. Even as a child, I would be extremely captivated by how people could hold that cone so effortlessly and make beautiful designs across someone’s palm. My hands have always been tiny so there was a point of time in a life, actually it quite a long period of time, when I would shy away from putting mehendi. I always felt that my hands were too small to make any worthwhile design on them at all. I think, after so long, I finally got myself a mehendi cone and put it on for myself. I don’t possess the skill and talent that a lot of my friends do when it comes to mehendi. But I surely possess the enthusiasm and a willingness to get better and well, remembering my TA’s words (even though she was speaking to me about English Literature, her advice is universal in that it can be applied across contexts), I think this is not some inane skill that cannot be learnt. I only believe that as I try more and more, experiment more and more, there will come a time when my designs shall look great. Until then, I am quite content with my mediocrity–I am here for the experience and the smell, oh god yes, the smell. The smell of mehendi is probably one of my most favourite smells in the world. Well, it is getting late and I shall be travelling by train alone for the first time in my life. I shall have fun, right?

And that’s my memory for the day.

PS: There are also a few questions I have about a few things, but I think I need to introspect before I feel like they can be written about. A few things have been plaguing me, a few worries, a few insecurities, a few problems–the usual.

Slight Disappointments

Today was the perfect example of a lazy day, a guilt-free lazy day. I did not get anything done today, I had nothing to get done and it felt great to not have any expectations resting on my shoulders. I mean, I do have quite a few expectations for myself but I shall get to them soon, just not today. There was dinner, a movie, a teeny tiny bit of shopping, I shall shop more tomorrow hopefully. I have plans to buy some new clothes because I feel my wardrobe needs a little something new in it. But knowing me, and my general miserliness, I will probably buy very little and call it a successful trip. Or better yet, buy nothing at all and come back.

I came back from a movie only half an hour back and I am completely exhausted from the day. I slept a lot even during the day, but a whole lot of good that did me because I am still sleepy now. The movie was slightly disappointing, I was expecting more, I guess, but it wasn’t bad. I am generally quite shit at reviewing movies, and to add to my already mediocre capabilities, I am also extremely sleepy and tired. So it probably is not a good time to type out my opinions on the movie, because my vocabulary seems quite limited to good/bad/nice. But it was a movie people had told me was wonderful and so I dragged my father along. He didn’t like the movie at all, though, while I don’t hold such an extreme view (in retrospect, I don’t hold extreme views in almost everything)

I also bought myself a mehendi cone, I love mehendi and I used to love putting it for other people and for myself. I was not great at it, but I still enjoyed it because I found the exercise very comforting a lot of the time. It made me happy and seeing the colour always made my day. I loved seeing the mehendi turn darker after the first day, I loved the smell of it that would linger for at least a day after I put it. If it was marudhaani, the smell would last for a few days, even with the perfume from soaps. But mehendi cones don’t do that, but that is not a failing, to be honest, because mehendi cones allow me an insane level of creative freedom that marudhaani can only dream of. I am most definitely doing my sleep blabber right now, so I am going to call it a night and get to sleep. Tomorrow shall be more productive, right?

And that’s my memory for the day.

A Good Day

I think today was a reasonably good day, in fact, a day that I won’t mind reliving. A few nice things happened today that made me feel quite in control of my life as well as giving me a sense of contentment. Contentment had been quite lacking in my life lately but as I keep saying, the last week has been pretty good and I am surprisingly in a place of near equilibrium. It is refreshing and I am completely glad to be in this space because it means that I am more adaptive, more equipped to deal with the thousand things that inevitably get messed up and not go according to plan. I feel like I have the ability to deal with that and it feels quite great to have my own backing in a sense (and here’s where I pray that I am not jinxing it).

Communication with him has completely stopped, has been non-existent for 10 days now I believe and I am slightly salty about it, in a very unjustified way. I mean, I never knew him enough, he never knew me enough, it was bound to dwindle and die out but I think I allowed myself the hope that it would go on for longer than what happened. Especially because there had been a conversation where we had talked about calling each other and it never came to fruition because that was the point where all communication kind of stopped. But it doesn’t bother me as much anymore, there are brief flashes of thought when I see his name on my Snapchat but it is soon replaced with a kind of dismissiveness. I wanted more but I didn’t get it and it is time I made peace with it and told myself that it was not a commentary on the kind of person I am.

I think that is the most important thing though because it is so easy to berate myself over this and tell myself that I wasn’t good enough, interesting enough, fun enough, pretty enough–a number of ‘not x enough’s that just make a pointlessly long list. The list would only serve to make me a miserable human being who hates herself because she believes someone she liked didn’t like her back. That is not the kind of person I am, nor do I want to be that kind of person. I think this kind of perspective and thought really helped keep myself grounded these last few days and it is scary (and also simultaneously awe-inspiring) to think that I existed without this side of me for quite a long time. The fact that I managed to survive is to tell me that I can, but it is not in my best interests to be that way for long.

I think conversations like these with myself are starting to come back into fashion. I spent a lot of time where I could not spend it with myself, I didn’t have anything to tell myself, to think about. I was not excited about mental gymnastics, so to speak. But the last week has been an exercise in thinking, not just academics but in life and I think that has done me a world of good. Everything becomes clearer if only some more thought is put into it. I also met my TA for a course (a woman I am completely awed by, who is so smart and beautiful and who I look up to) today and she really said some things to me that made me feel much at peace. She also complimented me and that made me feel extremely grateful because I am constantly in a state of doubt over whether I am cut out to be a literature major.

I think there were a lot of things that she said, but one thing that I felt extremely moved by was that she told me that interest means intelligence because it means that you are willing to work to make yourself better at it (and well she also said that I needed to speak more in class because she felt I was one of the smartest people in class and that both myself and the class would benefit from me voicing out my ideas and thoughts). I think that really struck me because, all this while, I had been thinking about whether I have the capability to be an English major, whether I had the skills and the brains for it.

The idea that there is no inherent capability, that the fact that I enjoy thinking about literature, that I enjoy intellectual stimulation and challenge, that I am willing to put myself through a hard process of thinking and going through my thoughts, means that I am ‘intelligent enough’ (to throw my own terms back at me). I am willing and interested in it and that’s all that matters. While I am also slightly sceptical (is that really all it takes? Doesn’t it set the bar too low?), I think this was one of the most sound advice that I have received. Sometimes, having someone give you some much-needed perspective helps a lot more than you would assume, right?

And that’s my memory for the day.

 

Useless, Lazy Days

I sometimes wonder if moving on is really that easy, or if I had it easy or if I had only been fooling myself. Regardless, the fact still remains that I may not have moved on as quickly as I like. But that’s okay, it is still happening, I can feel it and while it is a slow process, I know that it shall yield its results soon enough. I have withdrawn because distance helps me move on and I guess, I can only hope that it gets to work faster. It is too slow for my liking, at least the pace at which it has been happening lately. The only thing that gives me any semblance of hope is the fact that I can visibly see that the moving on is happening and so I know it will come to fruition soon enough. 

Today was an extremely lazy and unproductive day and I probably should not be quite so cavalier about it. But I also think that a whole week of poor sleep led me into this—I was so sleepy and tired and exhausted and I fell asleep just about everywhere. I could not concentrate on my work for a sustained amount of time, could not come to write my paper and get my work done. In retrospect, that was an extremely dumb move because that means I will have work piled up for a long period of time. But in my defence, I really needed the sleep. That’s all the defence I have, which is comical, almost. 

What is the deal with life, really? You breathe in breathe out and suddenly you’re expected to pay for that oxygen you consume in the form of living a life. You have a body you’re supposed to feed and protect (assuming this ‘you’ is separate from your body), you have a role in the world that you’re supposed to fulfil, there are others whose role is to ensure you fulfil yours, we are all censoring and self-censoring and we all take joy in making each other pay for their share of oxygen. It is quite ironical that people say “live your life” like it is this freeing thing when actually living your life is as restricted as you can get. There, I have officially become the old hag on top of Oracle mountain now.

Coming back to my ponderations and considerations on the topic of my own uselessness in getting my work done, the wifi is not working on my laptop. I have legitimately tried everything, from restarting to disconnecting to everything and it still refuses to work. This means that this post shall go up only later, whenever my wifi connects. But because I have written it earlier, I shall use that as an excuse to pre-time my post, this seems almost like time travel and maybe it is, I don’t know. But I don’t want it to go unnoticed, I think that the fact that I am writing this despite not being able to post it shows my own dedication to this cause. That should show me that if I set my heart to it, I can get my work done. It may seem like I can’t and I agree, sometimes I fail miserably. But I have the capability to get it done, the capability to move on, and so I shall, come whatever (where is this fighting spirit the times I really need it, I wonder). Positivity is one thing, but blind hope is another. This isn’t blind hope, right? 

And that’s my memory for the day. 

Impending Doom

There are days when things go horribly wrong when everything is coloured with the feeling of impending doom. I have never felt so helpless in my life as I felt today when I realised that I had let people down, let myself down and missed so many things. It was enough to push me into a state of crisis and sadness, pulling me down completely and making me feel utterly useless and pointless. I have very few things to worry about and I still end up screwing them up, for all my speech on wanting to be self-sufficient and dependable, I cannot even trust myself. I have lost trust in myself, I don’t believe that I can make myself pull through anymore. That is scary because I have never felt that way before (maybe the fact that I am scared means that all is not lost yet?).

There has been an underlying pool of sadness that has come to define my existence, I cannot exist without it it would seem. Everything I do rests on this base of sadness, at least that’s what I make of it. Now, I don’t mean that it has become intrinsic to me. I, for one, really hope that is not the case, that there’s nothing intrinsically sorrowful about my existence and myself. But then, it is extremely deceptive and I definitely feel like this has become my “natural” state of being (once you start reading Literary Theory, words like natural, being, etc start to seem extremely limiting. i.e. they are ruined forever, you can never use them in peace anymore–that is not a bad thing!). Today, I gave the example of a clear pool, a perfectly still pool to describe this sadness within me. There are small ripples that occur on its surface, small moments of joy and happiness, but they are all ultimately rooted in, find their existence in that pool of sadness. It was a pretty good analogy (and some might say that it is extremely lit major-esque, which I will gladly take as a compliment–I need validation about my major choice)

My right ear has been aching since today morning. It started in the morning and as the day progressed, only seems to have gotten worse. I have been tearing up in almost all of my classes, helpless tears as I was hit with pain and sadness. I tried my best to pass it off as my eyes just watering from the cold but somehow I have a feeling that someone might have noticed. Maybe I wanted someone to notice it, maybe I found some perverse pleasure in showing off my pain and getting the attention of other people? I don’t really have any answers for myself, might as well add more questions to the list. I can already imagine what a sensible Yashasvi might think of all this, she would think it is all worth a rat’s arse and that I need to get my shit under control. I would agree, I do need to do that but I am helpless at the moment, or at least I feel that way and that impacts the way I look at and respond to things around me.

I slept for nearly four and a half hours today evening when I excused myself from my flute class (owing to the pain in my ear) and came back to my room. I took a painkiller and decided that I needed sleep. The plan was to wake up in an hour and a half, get to dinner, work, go for a quiz, return, work some more. The day was extremely tiring and I was functioning on only a few hours of sleep, it seemed a good enough plan to get back on track. But that worked out really well when I ended up missing dinner, missing the quiz, waking up nearly three hours later than I wanted to. No one knew what had happened to me and I had gotten so used to being taken care of that I stopped taking care of myself. When people did not come to find me and ensure I was awake, I had ended up sleeping through my alarm. That is quite ‘alarm’ing (pardon my juvenile 2am humour) and it is a lesson on self-sufficiency. I need to learn to be there for myself from now onwards, I cannot let myself be ruined because I cannot take care of myself. I need to start being there for myself and this sounds easier on paper (or screen) but that’s okay. I have an appointment counsellor tomorrow, I can still turn this around I hope?

And that’s my memory for the day.

Trip Day 1

Today was an extremely busy day, a day of travel, of exciting travel, I daresay. I am in Belgium at the moment and it was a fun journey to undertake. We came by coach and I got the opportunity to travel by a double-decker bus for the first time. The coach station was strongly similar to a bus terminus back in India, except that it was more clean and orderly (though much less than the railway station or the airport or the tube station). The bus, the Eurotunnel, everything. This journey was a myriad of unique experiences that I am very glad I got the opportunity to experience. I am excited about this trip because my uncle is going to drive us around to places to see and to Paris, which I am hoping shall be a wonderful experience.

The bus started from London, and made its way to the Eurotunnel. It took us roughly two hours to get there and once we reached there, we had our passport checks done, used the toilets and made our way back inside the bus. The bus then proceeded to the platform to be loaded onto the train. Once we were fastened inside the huge train which carried our bus to France, we were off. It was wonderful to see a line of coaches and cars, all standing inside the huge train. It was pitch dark outside and we could get out of the bus and stand inside the train. Our bus driver was hilarious, he was constantly making announcements, and the poor, exasperated guy was savage in his comments. He spoke about toilet rules and etiquette (not even the most experienced man can stand and pee correctly in the moving bus), spoke about coming back to the bus on time (if you see light outside the train, come back immediately to the bus or else you will remain inside the Eurotunnel for the rest of your life. And I assure you, it is not going to be fun), spoke about being late (thanks to the four people who decided this was a good time to prance around Starbucks, we might have missed our train), about waking up (*whistles*). He was quite fun. 

Speaking of drivers, once in Belgium, our driver/guide is going to be my uncle. My uncle is a nice person, a bit strict and for the longest time, I was actually quite afraid of him. But he is a nice person, he is constantly pulling our legs and teasing us and he has strong morals. If he sees something wrong that my parents are doing with regards to me, he points it out and vice versa. And he treats me like an adult and speaks to me without a patronising tone or a tone that gives me too much importance. It is a good tone that makes me confident enough to speak, but not confident enough to bluff my way through. He is going to be driving us around here and I am excited about the trip because he does like to spoil us sometimes. He doesn’t mind spending at all, and he’s quite liberal. Today evening, I spilt some batter in the kitchen, I was extremely sorry and immediately set to work to clean it. My mother and father were mad and were passing angry comments at me, directed towards my inability to do anything at all. My uncle pointed it out later tonight and I felt spoken for and that is something I really respect. I still hold a bit of fear for him, but it is more of a respectful fear than any kind of malicious fear. 

Today’s bus trip reminded me of my general displeasure with travelling in cars or buses as compared to a train or aeroplane. I have minor motion sickness and the movement of the car and bus can set me off quite easily, giving me a headache and making me feel like I want to puke. It is not a very nice state to be in and I naturally hate travelling like that. That is one of the reasons why I sleep a lot when travelling, it helps me cope with this sickness because when I am asleep, this doesn’t matter. Sometimes I wish if there’s some solution like sleep to my motion sickness. I am constantly looking for other solutions because I tend to miss out on a lot of scenic beauty. I hate the taste of chewing gum and it only adds to my nausea at times, so that is out of the question. Any kind of food is out of the question. Maybe, someday in the future, I shall be able to stomach (pun unintended) this sickness better. Until then, I guess, I shall have to make compromises. And compromises are something I am used to anyway. This week shall turn out fine, no compromises, right? 

And that’s my memory for the day.

Living in the Head

There are days when I feel like I am stuck in that metaphorical dump where nothing seems to ever go to plan. The dump where I feel alone, demotivated, stressed (though about what, I can never tell), and a thousand other negative feelings and thoughts that pass through me. Today was almost one of those days, where I felt absolutely lazy and hopeless, where I wanted nothing more than to just lie down and sleep, forget the problems that were plaguing me. The fact that I could do that is a mark of my own privilege and good fortune, and this thought really does nothing to alleviate my problems. If anything, it adds on to them, because it is followed by the toxic thought that if I am so lucky in life, why am I being ungrateful for my blessings by feeling this way? It is a narrative that has been fed to me throughout my life, from everyone around me, including my own parents who have an almost cavalier attitude towards mental health. Unless it is so serious as to require medication and other forms of treatment, it is probably not an issue at all.

While that is not a narrative I believe in, there are times when quite unconsciously, it seeps in, most especially with respect to myself. I would chastise myself for “overreacting” despite being given “everything I wanted.” I would fall into periods of self-hate where I would struggle to reconcile the differences between why I was feeling a particular way and why I need not be feeling that way. And as I have come to realise, that is not an easy struggle, it leaves you panting for breath, trying to claw and catch hold of something that shall bring you back into the world of the sane. It is a very difficult process, a process that potentially has no end, you can hold it off for a while, but it shall resurface once in a while. Or at least that’s what happens to me, and I am by no means an expert. Maybe there are people in this world who can tell me that the battle can be won once and for all, I could definitely use that motivation and hope.

We all have a tendency to look for the ideal, to search for it, to revel in it, to marvel over it (please wait as I think of more beautiful verbs to use, at the risk of sounding like an absolute snobby English major). Talking of English major, when I was at camp, one of the guys told me that he was actually surprised by my English, that it was really good. That I didn’t obviously have a British accent, but I didn’t have an Indian one either, that my English sounded crisp and polished. I was flattered for a second, before realising that it could also be quite a toxic compliment. Toxicity just pervades every sphere of our life, there is something to be offended by all the time. Even things that seemingly intend no form of offence, seem to gather hate and offence. But oh well, that begs the question of who decides what’s offensive or not. Thinking about all this is like being a fly that gets stuck on a spider web, you think you finally got hold of the thread that binds you to the web, but when you begin to unravel it, you find yourself more soundly stuck and tangled up in the web. There are too many questions that can be raised with every single thing, you just cannot please everybody, even though in an ideal world, you can.

I have always been a fan of that dream of the ideal world, with the ideal peoples, with the ideal ideologies, with the ideal resources, the ideal everything. Even issues in that world would be the ideal issues, that can successfully employ the ideal solution. Oh, sexual harassment won’t even be a thing, because, with fluidity in gender, ideas of what it means to be a man or a woman shall be annihilated, which means that toxic cultural positions on the same shall cease to exist, rape or harassment shall find no meaning because everyone would be sensitised and understand the implications of their actions. I also realise that I have a new favourite word at the moment, toxic, I have used it quite a lot already.

Do you know what else is toxic? Specific kinds of friendships, and friends. I have been that kind of a friend many times in my life, mostly unknowingly. By the time I would realise and take steps to change, I would have already done my damage. That is not exactly soothing for my ego or my self-confidence, but I always believe that to pretend a problem does not exist is to give it undue weight and power. If I pretended I was never a toxic friend, it goes to say that I may potentially never take any steps for my own personal improvement and progress, thereby giving my problem a power that it does not deserve (and I daresay, shall never deserve). The more I think about it, the more convinced I am about that. After all, we all do live predominantly in our own heads, everything we do is a response from our head. And to live in that head, while simultaneously reconciling with our presence in the world outside is a big deal, a scary one at that. It does not do then, to let ourselves feed power to toxic things around us and inside us. Maybe I can take this advice from my head and truly use it, both inside and outside?

And that’s my memory for the day.

Seventh Day at Camp

It was the penultimate day today and I might actually miss a few people I met in this camp. It is quite sad for me because I think I have just found my groove here and already I’m being pulled away. I finally found a group I could have meals with, I was finally making some name for myself, was making a couple of friends, it was finally feeling like I could come to like this place and the people I met. Today was a day of many memories and I’m so tired that I don’t even have the energy to open my laptop and type this out. I’m instead typing on my phone and while it is much more difficult, I think I can handle it for a while at least.

The day started in the morning when we went as usual for Yoga. That was followed by prayers at the temple and then breakfast of toast and baked beans (joy, not). But things weren’t bad, we had lectures and they were pretty good, even though I dozed a bit here and there in the first one. In the second one, I was fine. I think I have somewhat become friends with this sub-lead who leads my brother’s group. He is quite nice and also kind of cute and fun to talk to but I wish I had the courage to get his Facebook or something. But well, I’m a coward and I may never ask, except if he asks me (but I doubt he will, I’m probably someone he’d forget as soon as the camp ends)

There was a photographer who came to the temple today, with the aim to capture millennial and faith. So he needed people born in the year 2000 and I was one of the only five who was born in that year. We took quite a lot of photos, together and a few individual photographs and we had to sign a consent form and things like that. Turns out he is quite a famous photographer and that these pictures might come on an exhibition he might hold later in the year. The photos were beautiful and I hope I get my pictures soon so that I can see all of them. The whole photo shooting was quite a fascinating experience, to be honest.

We had a psychology panel today which was quite disappointing. They did not approach issues of mental health with the sensitivity that I thought I could expect from professionals. So the leads and volunteers (who were ex-leads themselves), held a separate workshop of sorts for us. It was a good one, I was able to speak with quite a few people and it was an experience worth having. There’s an ex-lead here, who came back as volunteer, who is super-enthusiastic about everything and honestly quite cute too. He really encouraged me to tell my point out loud to the room and things like that. That’s the kind of person I’d like to be in the future, I guess. I already try to be that person with the little ones in the camp and a few of the kids actually seem to like me.

We had a campfire today and a talent show and I sang my Hindi-Tamil mixed song. There were so many people who came up to me and told me that I sang really well, including that ex-lead guy. He said he caught videos of me. Videos, of me, it really made my day. So many people to comment to tell me about singing. It has never happened to me ever before and I was very much taken aback. I think this whole camp has been just a series of events that made me surprised. Maybe I can bring myself to the next camp?

And that’s my memory for the day.

Sixth Day at Camp

Another day is done, another day of new experiences and some disappointments. Today has left me extremely tired and exhausted because there were a lot of activities today that were truly fun. The lectures were good and as expected, I seem to have lost my voice. I am unable to sing with the same amount of power that I used to, my voice does not project itself the way I want it to, I am not able to hit the high notes I used to be able to hit before. I have been drinking a lot of warm/hot water so that my throat could be somewhat soothed and I have tried my best not to speak as much as I used to. It is extremely difficult because I am, in my usual state, a very loud, boisterous, dramatic person. I will be shaking and dancing around, saying stuff at the top of my lungs, I struggle to stay ‘tame’. So this is really affecting my mood because, without the normal strength of my voice, I feel bereft of my own energy.

I know that it is a lot inside my own head and that good rest and good care of my throat can preserve at least what I have now in time for the performance on Saturday. But I am still extremely worried that I shall lose my voice and be left voiceless on the day. I really want to sing and this is a great opportunity. Moreover, my theory that my group lead is trying to sabotage my singing is becoming more solid by the day. Today, I realised that she was deliberately picking songs that I don’t know, simply because she wanted to sing instead (I think this is the case, I wish it wasn’t, but I have my reasons). I also learnt that she could have probably built a whole story around which team sings what. She had told me that they register in the morning, but I also learnt that each team chooses their song when they sing. I don’t know. Either way, I get the feeling that she is playing favourites, quite strongly.

We have a team performance we have to put up and she is, once again, doing the main singing. As a leader, I know that she could lead us, but to monopolise everything and give more opportunities for her friends is not the quality of a good leader. I am disappointed and I would wish that she won’t be a lead for the next camp. Of course, I may or may not return, but I think she doesn’t demonstrate the qualities of a good leader and to give her that position of power would be quite unfair, in my opinion. This is quite a bit of teen drama that I am trying my level best to dissociate from. I don’t really need this in my life. But we will soon get to know who shall be the leads and sub-leads next semester and so I can probably make a more informed choice about my attendance next year. I would probably come as a volunteer because I have made a few friends and I would like to see them again.

Today, they had bhajans from the Isckon foundation, they were called Kirtan Yoga. They had great music and once again, I was crying inside because I couldn’t sing like I used to. But I tried my best to not strain my voice too much because that would spell disaster for me. Of course, the other women were not singing loudly and it felt like I was the only one who was singing. That made me put undue pressure on myself. I was talking with a few kids who were homesick and not feeling quite well. One of the kids actually told me to my face that she liked me because I was speaking with her. That really touched me but also made me put more pressure on myself. That is something I always end up doing, isn’t it?

And that’s my memory for the day.

First Day of Camp

I am on the first day of camp and I sit here, connected to the internet through my phone, typing away on my laptop. The concept of culture shock is becoming increasingly important to me, as I see kids younger than me talking about their lives here, their school lives, their romantic lives, the drama and the subjects they do in school. I have never felt so enthralled but also simultaneously alienated all my life. It feels like there are plenty of places where I know much more than them, I know that my face goes into the polite, listening adult mode during those times. That smile, as I mentally laugh at their childishness. And there are other times when I feel like I know absolutely nothing at all, and that there’s so much more to learn and know. There are 14-year-olds talking about makeup, about asking people out and while I know that it is super commonplace, I cannot get over how much I have not seen in my own school life.

The fact that I am one of the very few 18-year-olds and the fact that those who are my age have already come to this camp so many times that they are now leads and sub-leads of the teams. One kid thought I was a parent, my own sub-lead thought I had come to see off my kid, a few kids believed me when I told them that they had to leave their shoes off in some place, even though I had absolutely no clue about protocol. I think that is quite wonderful when people think that you’re an adult. But when you are doing things with the other kids who are younger than you, it is not exactly nice. But this is what I get for signing up, and I should probably just stay quiet about it and not crib much.

The kids around me are all Indian kids, who have lived in England almost all their life. They speak little to nothing of their “mother tongues,” obviously cannot read or write them, are quite spoilt (at least in comparison to how I was raised), and I sometimes find them quite annoying. But I am biased, I have particular ideas of how people and children should grow up and behave, ideas that are constantly challenged and have undergone large and drastic modifications nonetheless. My sub-lead did not even know about the team she was leading. Each team is given the name of a branch of Indian philosophy, mine is named Samkhya, and she had quite haphazardly copied some stuff from Wikipedia and was explaining stuff to us. I knew more about Samkhya, even though I never learnt about it specifically. She couldn’t even pronounce the name right, or even read the Sanskrit words in her description. But as I said, I am quite biased against things like that, I am trying to not be too judgemental. Though in my defence, she was leading it and the camp booklet had a note from the sub-leads and she’d sounded quite enthusiastic about the philosophy and what it taught. I was somewhat disappointed to see that she knew close to nothing about it in reality.

It is bedtime here, people are slowly getting to sleep, we have to wake up early tomorrow morning. This is just the first day and the camp is for a whole week. I have joined the music team for performing on the cultural programmes night, so there’s that to look forward to. They don’t have mugs in the toilets, which means that I shall have to learn to use toilet paper. It is not a lesson I am looking forward to, but these processes are out of my control. So I shall have to learn to handle this too. It is just the first day and there already seem to be quite a lot of difficulties, and my biased mind is quite obviously not in support of quite a lot of changes and challenges here. But that is the thing about minds and biases, they can be overcome. If my one-week stay here turns out to be quite a learning experience (which I really hope it will be), I will be quite glad. This post shall end here because of lights off. It shall be a good week, won’t it?

And that’s my memory for the day.