A life in a year.

A few weeks ago I saw the AIESEC Brazil posting a quote that truly summarized my experience: “An exchange is not a year in your life. It’s a life in a year.” This is exactly what my more than a year spent living in India and backpacking in southeast Asia has been.

I hadn’t been outside Europe before I moved to India, so this was my first real encounter with a developing country and an emerging superpower. Real street food sold from (dirty and possibly health-threatening) food stalls, first taste of bananas, mangos, coconuts, papayas, pineapples, chikoo, dragonfruits, jackfruits, durian, mangosteans and litchi that haven’t travelled thousands of kms to the supermarket. Indian food. Chai. Noodles. First Indian/Hindu weddings. Visits to hindu, buddhist and sikh temples, mosques. Calls to prayers. Closer encounters with Tibetan monks and nuns. Experiencing how different religions can coexist in peace. Working with hindus, muslims, buddhists and Christians in one workplace. Indian art of “jugaad” – making do with whatever resources you have. Sharing a meal with thousands of others in the holiest of all Sikh temples. Visiting the border with Pakistan. Watching people being cremated. Traveling solo. Swimming in the Arabian Sea, Indian Ocean and Gulf of Thailand. +47’C in May and living without an air-conditioning. Monsoon rains, heat and humidity. The enormous smog on cold winter days in Delhi. Electric blankets. Living in a city of 20 million.

The extreme income inequality, poverty, extremely rich people, beggars, people without limbs. Bomb blast/terrorist attack on my city. My first earthquake. Security guards with rifles everywhere. Street harassment. Culture shock. Huge anger. Extremely polluted environment. Change in the worldview. Learning bits of hindi. Bas, chalo didhis & bhaiyas, theek hai, accha, na, haa are not willing to leave me even now. Bargaining. Bribes and forged documents. Living without an internet connection at home. Coping with problems with water and electricity supply, blackouts, hand-washing clothes. Having a maid. Ceiling fans. Dirt-cheap hotels. Frozen water-pipes.  Monkeys everywhere. 4 cm long cockroaches. Stray dogs, and cows mixing with the traffic. Slums.

Meeting people from all over the world. Having flatmates in Delhi from 15 different countries – Netherlands, Brazil, Germany, Argentina, Spain, Greece, Mauritius, Romania, Poland, India, Colombia, Chile, Italy, Finland, Serbia. Portuñol. A complete disappointment with AIESEC India – exactly zero contact and support from them in the 11 months I spent in India. A complete falling in love with my latino family, with my b144, a119 and party goers family in Delhi.

Rooftop parties, pool parties, parties in posh 5*hotels and mansions. VIP entrance and guest lists, free food and drinks. Partying and working 6 days a week for weeks on – and, actually, never oversleeping work. Job that comprised many elements – I was a trainer, teacher, entertainer, clown, tour guide, photographer, researcher, judge, writer, copy-editor, economist. Experiencing positive & negative discrimination based on my skin colour. The white walking ATM syndrome. Getting paid for being a white girl and working as a hostess and bartender at weddings. A call centre. Being an extra in a Bollywood movie.

First ride on a motorbike. On a winding Himalayan road. Jumping out of moving buses. Sleeper trains. Rickshaws. 3 people and a dog on a scooter. 7 people in an autorickshaw. Drunk drivers. Taj Mahal. Carnaval. Left-side traffic. Rock climbing, rappelling, trekking and sleeping under the stars in Himalayas. Whitewater rafting and swimming in Ganges. Paragliding. Zorbing. Accidently running from bulls. Thai massages. Camel safari and sleeping under shooting stars in the Great Thar Desert. Riding and swimming with an elephant. Skyscraper jungle. Universal Studios. Disneyland. Snorkeling and scuba diving with sea turtles, sharks and the most amazing and colourful variety of fish. Hitchhiking in Malaysia. 10 days of a silent meditation retreat. Inner peace. World’s oldest rainforest. National wildlife parks. Safari. Paradise islands. India. Nepal. Thailand. Cambodia. Malaysia. Singapore. Friends. Inspiration. 

I had set quite a lot of expectations before coming to India and now, looking back, I can see that quite a few of them were not meant to be fulfilled, be it because of my ignorance and lack of knowledge about my destination before arriving there or because of a changed perspective and priorities. However, over the time spent there I have experienced and gained a lot more than I could have hoped for or that I can ever express in words.