Why do I want to Go To India?

Well I am getting ready for India…
I have 15 days left on American soil under I embark on my wild and crazy adventure but truly only about 10 of those days really count because I will be at orientations with hundreds of foreign exchange students and that is when you really wonder where in the world am I! Possibly because everyone around you is speaking in what seams like a million different languages and tongues and you happen to be situated in the middle of the Noah’s ark of people with two finish to your left, two Brazilians to your right, and you are smack dab in the middle of no native English speakers. Which in my mind really is a grand time!!! Now if you know me you may question my sanity of going to India, and I want to assure you that I am fully sane. I just have a love of the Third World Countries, I have a tendency not to believe people or at least to be questionable unless I see it for myself and this is how I see India. You have a good chunk of the worlds people saying India is the most wonderful place in the world and also a good chunk of people who think it is full of crazy people who can never help you on the other side of the world when you call Dell or United Airlines (as I found out) for help on the other side of a few ponds, which just causes great frustration between nations and your relationship with you and your phone, as when you get off having not learning or fixed anything many of you will proceede to throw it against the nearest wall or if in an airplane at the annoying kid who keeps kicking your seat!!! Back to my original question, why just am I going to India? Every time I get asked this question I try to give some witty answer depending on how the question was posed. In example, if I was asked, “why the hell are you going to India?” (Direct quote, tally of times people have asked me this 5) well I would respond with something like “Well to get away from you,” or if it more respectful but I know on the inside they are thinking the same question my answer would be more along the lines of, “to fix my Karma.” Meaning that I need to address the negative energy they are sending me (Note: I really have no idea about Karma +Will find out more in India). So want to know the real reason I am going to India, all right! Because I find India to be a mystery, and who does not love a good mystery! There was a good reason my mother let Scooby Doo be my favorite show till, well I guess it still is my favorite show (other then prime time soaps… +another reason to go to India, they have really good soap operas I have heard on the Travel Channel). India is a place of wonder, such as just this morning India’s Taj Mahal was named one of the New7Wonders of the World (+Taj Mahal, I can’t wait to see it!!! Taj or Bust!) India is a land of very much old and history but also with new technology and sooooo many people it bridges the old and the new into what I have been told a well rounded balance. But truly, India is a land you have to experience, you cant just watch the Travel Channel and maybe some Bollywood movies and listen to some sitar music (all things I love), but you have to mingle with the people, you have to eat with your hands, you have to live without toilet paper (well this can be an exception for us city girls, I am brining my own!), but really you have to be able to look, listen, touch, hear and feel India, you can’t wander in for a few weeks and be like, “WOW! This is India, cool! Time to Go Home,” Life is not like that, as much as I want to see the world I know I have to realize life is not The Amazing Race, it is slow, it is long, and it moves fast if you don’t stop to look around every once in a while I might miss it. This is why I want to go to India, I want to realize that not every Indian sounds like Aupoo and runs the local Kwikee Mart (from the Simpsons…hehe). A story for the interested, last summer I was invited to go to India, actually to where I am going this year, Pune, India. The trip was for a week or so at a resort with a pool, some community service would be preformed friends would be met and jet leg would really get the better of you, and the price (other then priceless which the trip would have been) was the same I would pay pretty much for my entire year… Well all in all I decided to go backpacking through the United Kingdom instead. So my dream of India was not fulfilled by my 17th birthday (that was not a goal or dream the phrasing just sounded pretty, and hey 18th birthday not to shabby!). But I realized (with the help of a Bollywood movie) that the India in a week would never have worked. If anyone has ever scene Bride and Prejudice, the Bollywood version of Jan Austin’s Pride and Prejudice (in the movie form) you may know what I am going to speak of, if you have not scene it go to the video store (Blockbuster, Hollywood, the Library what every you prefer) and RENT IT!!! NOW! It is a very very good well done Bollywood Movie, and it will get you started on Bollywood it is a good first movie, you must see it! Well in that movie the equivalent of Mr. Darcy is a hotel chain owner and wants to put up a Resort in India, and the Indian equivalent of Elizabeth Bennet is like NO!!! She then goes on to say that you simply cannot experience real India from inside a resort or in a pool, you cannot experience real India when you are on the outside, you have to some how make your way to the inside to see India, you have to be able to see the poverty and the wealth, you have to be able to see the dirt and the soot, you have to be able to see the new and the old, you have to be able to see the religions, the nationalities, the mountains, and the valleys, the people and their lives, you have to be able to recognize and accept India for what it is third world or not, India is a country that everyone who is ready should see, India really is where I want to be.