Impressions of Chennai and the Volunteering Begins

Saturday December 19^th

Written from the bed of our new residence. Dinner last night was eaten in the third restaurant that we had located in the small 6 storey hotel that we were staying in. It was situated on the top floor of the Grand Residence Hotel and was a rooftop indoor/outdoor bar/restaurant. It sported a translucent plastic roof that had water cascading down it, for some type of dramatic effect throughout the meal. The name of the place was Kebabeque. Serious points for originality. The food was delicious, as has been the case throughout the early stages of our visit, the southern Indian cuisine’s reputation for great taste and delicious seasoning is proving to be accurate.

TV offers up multiple channels – virtually all of which show mindless, banal videos featuring hordes of Indians dancing a la Thriller with absurdly amateurish acting. The backdrops are childish and the plots are sophomoric. Inevitably, the movies feature a mega-Bollywood star and starlet involved in a facile romantic misadventure often involving a sub-plot featuring a stooge whose intellect, acting ability and behaviour make the other and better known Stooges – Larry, Curly, and Moe, appear more akin to the Fairbanks and Barrymores by comparison. And there are channels and channels of this drivel.

I did manage to find a news channel that covered Flopenhagen from the Indian perspective. No mater where on the planet one was watching this mockery unfold, the clear and ever-present sound of the Earth weeping interfered with the audio portion of the broadcast.

Following a tasty breakfast that offered up the same choices as yesterday. Lori noted that the recipes and styles of presentation of the meals probably haven’t changed much in a millenia or so, whereas in North America chefs are constantly modifying both content and style, trying to upstage and outmanoeuvre each other. The Indian mentality seems to be ‘This is Breakfast’, with no burning need to alter process or package. The approach is not as interesting nor does it offer up a surprise, but it indicates a contentment with the existing condition that seems to reflect the general attitude held by the populace.

We took a stroll through the neighbourhood but not before Lori re-shot the photo out of our bedroom that just yesterday produced the “cow outside the front door of the building behind us” shot. As of today the same shot will never again be available as a result of the progress of the barefoot non-power tooler construction workers who have managed to add half a floor to the building behind our hotel at a speed that rivals bamboo

We spent an hour winding our way through the backstreets alternatively marvelling at the plethora of small shops and factories, interspersed with temples, clinics, garbage swamps, broken motor cycles three wheeled taxis, bicycles, motorbikes, trucks, cars, schoolchildren coming home, families walking in the steets and cows, lots of cows.

There were dogs everywhere, too. A vast hodgepodge of a few remaining thatched roofed homes, newly constructed, well maintained concrete residences, and everything in between. The children and adults stopped to say hello, enquiring as to where we’ve come from and posed for photos for which was only too happy to oblige. I engaged a young trio of boys, each equipped with a spinning top and tried my hand at a skill I had possessed years ago. Unlike riding a bicycle, this talent takes a while to come back. I made a couple of semi-lame attempts and feeling a bit self conscious as a street full of Indians stopped their activity to watch a 55 year old white guy cavort with 3 brown kids. A few more tosses and I would have nailed it but I couldn’t deal with the interim embarrassment associated with my incompetence.

Stephen Raja, our group leader from Global Volunteers was scheduled to pick us up from our hotel at noon and, in non-true Indian style, was at the door at the appointed hour. The guest was less than a kilometre away from where we had been staying. We checked out, paying a bill of $400 which included 2 meals, snacks, airport pickup and Joe’s tour. Quelle ripoff! Arriving at the guest house, we were shown to our room, which rivalled or surpassed the quality of our hotel room. There were 4 of us ensconced in this particular guest house which was used to contain the overflow from the main Global Volunteers residence. We also have better hot water facilities, a fact that Stephen requested us not to raise or gloat over in front of the other volunteers. The annex is shared by two other single occupants, 1 male, 1 female. As is my usual wont, I fantasized that our room mate would turn out to be a tall Nordic blonde in her early 20’s, hopelessly attracted to middle aged Jewish men and that Lori would be forced to share me for the duration of the trip.

The girl, Candice, was a zaftig New York Jewess who could have been seated next to us at any bar mitzvah that we have ever attended. She was a formerly practising corporate lawyer looking to retreat from her previous world trying to redirect herself by providing care to those most in need.So much for exotica. The guy, Matt greeted us at the door having just emerged from a shower , a handsome 21 year old with towel around his waist, pecs, delts and every other cut and buff muscle glistening under the remaining water droplets dripping off his sculpted torso. Matt was in university pre-med hoping to ultimately help the world. Young bright eyed and enthusiastic. Without even going to battle Lori won.

We had lunch at the main place and got to meet the other 10 volunteers – all female – for lunch and a how do you do. More character assassinations to follow.