The Mighty Jungle

This post has taken me some time to write but I finally feel ready to share a little bit about my experience volunteering at the refugee camp known as the Jungle, located in Calais, France. Because the immigration crisis in general and the status of refugees in Calais in particular has received little media attention in the US, I have put a lot of time into providing an accurate and informative political and historical context to describe what is going on there at the moment. The information I include is based both on my experience volunteering over the course of nine days, and on the many newspaper articles and websites I cite throughout the post. I encourage you to comment or message me if there is anything you find inaccurate or misleading--it's definitely a work in progress, and I had the privilege of meeting people with a much richer understanding of these issues than I have. If you're not particularly interested in the background info, scroll down to where I start talking about volunteering, and stay tuned for a second post! For starters I will answer a few basic questions:

Where is Calais?

Calais and Dunkirk lie directly across the Strait of Dover from England

Calais is a mid-size city in Northern France, home to a large chemical refinery, some mediocre seashore, and quite a bit of 1950s-style concrete architecture. Most importantly, Calais is the major port for ferries and trains that cross the English Channel, connecting England and the UK to Continental Europe. A very large volume of commercial and leisure traffic flows between Calais and the UK throughout the day and night. It is for this reason that refugees have gathered in this specific geographic location for at least the past fifteen years. The spontaneous refugee camp that arose in this place has come to be known as the Jungle. For more information on the history of Sangatte, the refugee camp that existed in this area in the early 2000s, read this informative article. Briefly, a camp was opened by the Red Cross in 1999 in response to the flood of Kosovar refugees fleeing attempted genocide in the Balkans. A warehouse that had housed machinery was repurposed to hold 200 asylum seekers. Within two years, there were 2,000 people living in a space that was impossible to heat in the winter and unbearably hot in the summer, and the camp was closed in 2002. This article has a neat little timeline of the history of refugees in the area. A second ad hoc refugee camp formed in Dunkirk, a town about 30 miles northeast of Calais, and the site of a major World War II battle. Conditions in this camp were even worse than those in the Jungle, prompting MSF (Doctors Without Borders) to donate €2.6 million of the €3.1 million needed to build a planned camp in nearby Grande-Synthe. The Dunkirk town hall put up the remainder of the funds, as the national government was strongly opposed to this action as part of its Let's Treat People Like Garbage So They'll Stop Coming official policy. I will write much more about Dunkirk in another post, but wanted to provide a full context of the area.

Who is coming to Calais?

The refugees living in the Calais Jungle are from a variety of places across East and North Africa (Sudan, Eritrea, Ethiopia), the Middle East (Iraq, Syria, Iran), and South and Central Asia (Afghanistan, Pakistan). Within these groups are subsets of people that you might expect: Muslims from the Darfur region of Sudan, Kurds from Iraq and Iran, Bedouins from Kuwait, people from the tribal regions of Pakistan and Afghanistan. Main spoken languages are Pashto, Urdu, Arabic (spoken by the Middle Easterners, the North Africans, and the Muslim Sudanese), Farsi, Tigrinya, and Kurdish. Some people have picked up bits of European languages from places they passed through on their way to Calais--Italian or German, usually--some speak conversational English, a handful speak basic French, and many speak next to nothing outside of their mother tongue. The vast majority of the camp consists of men between the ages of maybe 17-35, many, if not most, of whom have families in their home country relying on them for income and/or safe passage in the future. According to the most recent census conducted by Help Refugees and published online on May 10, 2016, there are approximately 5,200 people living in the Calais Jungle. This number includes 528 children, of whom 420 (74%) are unaccompanied. I had a brief conversation with one of the census coordinators, who made clear the difficulties inherent in basing statistical analysis on word of mouth. The census is conducted by volunteers who have the whole camp mapped out into sections. 

The spray painted numbers indicate a makeshift
address to aid conductors of the census. 4N35 means the 4th
section of the north part of the camp, shelter number 35.

Each shelter/hovel/tent is marked with a spray painted address of sorts and those carrying out the census systematically approach each shelter to inquire as to its inhabitants. More often than not, however, not all inhabitants are in their homes, so the census requires trusting what people say about themselves and their neighbors. Further complicating this process is the fact that between 40-70 people a day are estimated to be arriving to Calais, while others leave the camp in attempts to smuggle themselves into the UK or seek asylum elsewhere. 

Why are people coming to Calais right now?

The answer to this question is complex and varies widely depending on both whom you ask and where the migrant is coming from. From the people I spoke with, many people are coming from parts of the world that have been enmeshed in violent conflicts for decades. I spoke with a man from Afghanistan who had served as a translator for US Special Forces and was subsequently denied any US support in leaving the country after the Taliban targeted his family for his cooperation with the Americans. After his father and brother were killed by the Taliban for this reason, he knew that he remained in Afghanistan on borrowed time. "Our country has been at war for as long as I have been alive," he said. "I have no memory of my country before there was war. There is no future there. I went many times to the American Embassy in Kabul, I said, 'Look at what I have done for you. I am not safe, my family is not safe.' They said there was nothing they could do." I had heard stories like this before I went to Calais, most notably in an episode of This American Life, but to hear it spoken to me from the mouth of a human being standing in front of me was heartbreaking. I felt a tremendous sense of shame on behalf of the US, not that I'm patriotic in the first place, and told him so. "I know that you are not your country," he said, and again I felt embarrassed, both by the fact that he was in the position of consoling me and because his attitude, despite everything he has been through, bears a nuanced understanding of global identity that is completely absent in the widespread American attitude that we shouldn't admit refugees because WHAT IF THEY'RE IN ISIS AND ARE TRYING TO DESTROY AMERICA???!!! 

Most of the Sudanese people I met are from the Darfur region, and many of them had spent the last few years living elsewhere in Africa or the Middle East. I met a completely charming sixteen-year-old who is lucky enough to be in the Jungle with his twin brother, two younger siblings and mother. In impeccable English, he explained to me that although he was born in Darfur, he spent most of his life in Libya after fleeing the conflict. Now that the situation in Libya was going belly up, his mother decided it was time to try their luck seeking asylum in Europe. I bumped into him again on my last night in Calais, and he told me his family had been granted asylum in France and would be relocated the following week. 

I should mention that everything I relate that was told to me should be taken with a grain of salt, to the extent that it is impossible for me to know the truth behind these stories. It is of course possible that the guy from Afghanistan had not served in the Special Forces, that this kid and his family were not granted asylum in France, that the true ages and identities of the people I met are entirely different from what they told me. I can only relate what I was told and am happy to be corrected and confronted by those more knowledgable than me. 

How are European countries responding to this intensified migration crisis?

Responses to the influx of refugees from the Middle East, South Asia and Africa vary widely across Europe. The main points of entry to the continent are Italy, Greece and Turkey. While an average of 1,000-2,000 refugees are crossing from Turkey into Greece every day, countries including Austria, Macedonia, Serbia, Croatia and Slovenia have effectively closed their borders to all incoming migrants, trapping asylum seekers in Greece and, according to the Human Rights Watch Greece specialist Eva Cossé, risking "turning Greece into a giant refugee camp." This figure of arriving migrants is down significantly from 2015, during which the daily average was 2,000-3,000.  In an attempt to stem the flow of human migration, the EU signed a deal with Turkey in March, stipulating that Turkey will "take back all migrants and refugees who enter Greece illegally, including Syrians, in return for the EU taking in thousands of Syrian refugees directly from Turkey and rewarding it with more money, early visa-free travel and progress in its EU membership negotiations" (Guardian). That this deal may be entirely illegal according to international law is besides the point.

In speaking with some of the volunteers who have either been to Greece recently or have contacts in the humanitarian aid sector there, many Greek citizens are highly activated in favor of welcoming refugees, as evident in the success of projects like Refugees Welcome, a group that initially began in Berlin to match incoming refugees with citizens willing to share their home. However, the combination of Greece's continually dire financial situation and a longstanding, active fascist party, is causing the Greek welcoming of refugees to wear thin. One video, taken by the Turkish Coast Guard. appears to show a Greek Coast Guardsman trying to spike an inflatable boat carrying dozens of refugees in order to sink it. Another video, seemingly taken from within a boat, shows a similarly hostile interaction between migrants and Turkish authorities. According to the New York Times, "The absence of functioning government institutions in Greece — and the total lack of a collective European Union policy to address the crisis — have created the conditions that hateful ideologies need in order to grow." The shift towards isolationist nationalism is occurring throughout Europe and the US (Trump, anyone?) and should not be taken lightly. One of the first rules I was told at the Help Refugees warehouse was not to take any photos of the outside of the facility, as there were active fascist groups in the area whom organizers fear may attack aid workers and resources. Meanwhile, in the UK, lots of misconceptions exist about just how many refugees are seeking asylum and remaining in the country, in addition to why and how many people want to enter in the first place. Britain has committed to accepting 20,000 Syrian refugees over the next four years, representing 0.03% of the overall population and 0.4% of the migrant population. The graphics in this article make clear the seriously low proportion of asylum seekers the UK is accepting, relative to other European countries such as Germany, Hungary, France, Italy, Sweden and Austria.  The US plans to accept only 10,000 Syrians out of the 4 million who have been displaced by the ongoing civil war. 

Southern part of the camp, post-eviction

Notice that this pole is completely charred

The Evictions

In February of this year, a court in Lille granted the city of Calais legal permission to evict inhabitants of the southern half of the camp.  These evictions were no joke and occurred over a very short period of time. Authorities said the evictions would take three weeks; it took them just over two. Authorities said force would not be used to remove people. But the volunteers and refugees I met told a different story, in which police in full riot gear entered the camp and systematically went through section by section, throwing tear gas into shelters to force people out, beating them with batons and setting fire to the cleared homes. One of the chefs I worked with, who has been volunteering for the better part of the last six months, described pulling people out of burning buildings--sometimes refugees, sometimes riot police. Multiple people described French police and firefighters not only refusing to intervene and extinguish fires in the camp, both during the evictions and on a regular basis, but actively preventing both residents and volunteers from doing so. Another long-termer told me that in the Ashram Kitchen, a community-run restaurant staffed by volunteers and camp residents, people were constantly forced to run outside because of the tear gas. At one point they threw away all the food they had prepared, as they were worried it had been contaminated by so much gas. The population of the camp, as estimated by Help Refugees, went from roughly 5,500 to under 5,000, and results of the most recent census predict that the current population of the camp will reach 5,500 within a month's time, only now the refugees inhabit half the space they once had. French authorities are reinforcing their policy that any top-down approach to improve conditions will encourage even more people to migrate; the justification for evictions was that conditions were so awful. As one volunteer was quoted in the Guardian, 

“We agree about the Jungle not being a suitable place for people to live, and we’d totally support the local authorities to sort this out,” she said. “But we thought people would get a week to consider their options. And it would have worked. But wade in with gas canisters and you’re going to scatter people and cause fear and resentment.”

Empty tear gas canisters as art

Refugees were given the option to move to the container camp built by the government, in which cooking is banned and fingerprints are required for entry, despite the fact that at the time of the eviction there were less than 150 of 1,500 total spaces left. They were also offered transportation to a refugee camp in Montpelier, a small city in the South of France, though it's easy to understand why they would be apprehensive about following the same people who just tear gassed them onto a bus to an unknown location. In the wake of the evictions, several smaller "jungles" have sprung up in wooded areas between Calais and Dunkirk. In addition, 129 unaccompanied minors remain unaccounted for. 

The container camp, built by the French government

Cooking is not allowed in the container camp and 10-12
people sleep in bunk beds within each unit

Volunteering

My days began each morning at breakfast in the hostel, where I would meet other volunteers and people would ask for and solicit lifts to the warehouse and camp. My first few days, I traveled with Bertrand, a super nice French dude from Marseille who lives in Bristol and runs a  small theater company. We ended up spending a lot of time together, as he worked in the kitchen also and we went twice to the library in the camp after working to participate in the conversation group for refugees interested in practicing their skills. He had spent several days volunteering in October, and it was good for me to have someone to bounce my reactions and feelings off of. 

I would arrive at the warehouse by 9AM and head straight to the kitchen, though the first few days I went to the daily briefing for volunteers in which long-termers go over the suggested etiquette for being in camp--women shouldn't wear leggings and should put up their hair, no one should be going to camp unless they're doing a specific job which requires it, no one should be in the camp after dark, period. This meeting was my first real introduction to the unique ecosystem between volunteers and refugees, which involves dynamics between long term volunteers and short term volunteers, the types of people that are drawn to this work, and the standard dynamics between lots of people with both great intentions and personal agendas. Most of the long term volunteers live onsite in caravans next to the warehouse. 

Donations in the warehouse need to be sorted

The caravans are unheated--I can only imagine how absolutely freezing they must have been in the winter, considering the fact that I was there in May wearing a short-sleeved shirt, a long-sleeved shirt, a fleece, a down jacket and a rain jacket in the middle of the day. There are portapotties and an outdoor sink, as well as a shower in a caravan that seems to never have hot water (not that I know from experience). People there long term, meaning a month or more, generally work seven days a week, taking a day or two off every few weeks to go home or earn money for a few days. Though I definitely don't have what it takes to be so cold for so long, (honestly that is hands down the condition I would find most difficult to tolerate), I understand and empathize with the drive to stay and contribute as long as possible. When you're part of a team that is feeding 1700 people per day, people who have been objectified and marginalized in a way that is hard to imagine prior to seeing it in person, actively participating in a movement to restore a semblance of comfort or dignity by nourishing people with hot, healthy food--that's a feeling that is hard to walk away from. Please don't misunderstand what I am saying as giving myself a pat on the back. On the contrary, I feel tremendously uncomfortable when people congratulate me for "doing such a good thing," as I feel so tiny and so insignificant and contributing so little in relation to so many of the other people I met over the course of my time there. I won't pretend that I went to volunteer for any reason other than that it made me feel good and useful and valued after a year of feeling needy and listless. I am lucky that I was raised by people who taught me that serving others was the highest and most honorable pursuit, and in some ways to evaluate my own self-worth on the positive contributions I made to people and communities around me. 

I constantly feared I was contributing to the sense of voyeurism that is hard to avoid as a white, non-migrant volunteer. A reporter from the Atlantic articulates this feeling in a thoughtful article on Syrians in Calais: 

"The place, to use British Prime Minister David Cameron’s dehumanizing rhetoric, was 'swarming' alright—but with journalists looking for a story, not with migrants. Within minutes of me striking up a conversation with a refugee from Afghanistan, an irate and imperious reporter intervened to commandeer her “subject” for further probing. I was taken aback. And yet, not five minutes later, I was asking my guide where I could find the camp’s Syrian inhabitants, and who among them might speak English." 

I found myself frequently judging other volunteers for doing the exact thing I was, and justifying to myself why the way in which I was behaving was somehow different, better, more considerate, less patronizing. I was particularly frustrated by a woman who was distributing food with us one day, a pensioner from Ireland who made no effort to converse with the people she was serving and insisted on having her photo taken during the busiest moment of distribution. After we packed up at the end of the afternoon, we were invited for a cup of chai in the Sudanese tent, an enormous canvas structure in which maybe seventy cots and sleeping bags are crammed next to one another to provide warmth and security for the men that live there. 

A safe place for toothbrushes in the Sudanese tent

Inside the Sudanese tent

We sat on the edge of the cots, sipping sweet chai and meeting some of the guys, one of them joking, "Here in Sudanese tent, everyone is Ahmad or Muhammad!" The other volunteer turned to me, clicking her tongue and saying, "These poor, poor Sudanese boys." In processing why this statement and its accompanying attitude made me so angry, I realize that what bothers me most about it was the reinforcement of volunteers and refugees as a mutually exclusive dichotomy. Part of what I interpret as being most damaging about the emergence of these refugee camps, as opposed to concerted efforts at resettlement, is that it sends the message that we are not the same, that some lives are worth more than other lives, that refugees are objectified as pitiable "souls" (another term I heard used to describe people in the camp), rather than people with whom we stand in solidarity. If this all sounds trite and cliché, I apologize. But seeing with my own eyes what 5,000 individuals, desperate for safety, fair choices and the most basic human rights of food, shelter and dignity, was a shattering and deeply devastating experience. Volunteering in Calais has left me with many contradictory feelings, knowledge of truths that are both opposite and coexisting. 

Food for 1,700 people

I spent the better part of two days peeling tiny onions. 

My presence there was both important and meaningful, while being completely insignificant and lacking an impact in any larger sense. I was filled with disgust and shame at the ways in which my government and tax dollars support the economic and physical violence that has driven people from their homes to this place, and experienced a profound hopelessness in the face of the enormity of this crisis. Yet I also met the most beautiful, giving and kind people that spend every day working towards a better future. Interacting with these people--volunteers and refugees alike--filled me with a sense of optimism and faith in human potential. These impressions, opposite and equally true, make it difficult for me to speak about my experience in a coherent manner.  

Me and the Robot Coupe: A Love Affair
Chefs needed six trays of sliced onions every day.

HELLA garlic. Just imagine how long it took to peel these.

Food distribution

Salad mixin'

There were many times when I was reminded of Corrymeela, the peace and reconciliation residential center in Northern Ireland where I volunteered for a year. Both places draw a somewhat self-selecting crowd of young people, hippies, activists, retired do-gooders, and non-normative people who live their lives off the beaten path. I think this type of work and service tends to attract people who volunteer to feel part of the solution rather than the problem, and who tend to have poor boundaries when it comes to giving too much of themselves (thought maybe I am just projecting). It's clear that many people burn out volunteering, yet also fear that if they leave, things will fall apart. To be sure, at least in the kitchen, every volunteer does matter. As was evident in my conversations with an awesome Aussie who has been coming regularly since October, there are many tasks and functions that fall through the cracks and don't get done when certain people are not around. It's also easy to imagine how egos could easily interfere with the day-to-day business of providing for so many people in need. 

Formerly the southern part of the Jungle

At the end of my first day, I went with Bert to Jungle Books, a library that was established by volunteers where English and French classes are offered, wifi is (sometimes) available, and a generator allows people to charge their phones. In the evenings, volunteers come after working in the warehouse to help people practice their language skills. For many, if not most, volunteers, this is their only opportunity to actually interact with people who live in the camp and to see it. Jungle Books is one of the only structures on the south side of the camp that the police agreed not to destroy during the evictions, so it now lies outside the main camp area (though it used to be right in the middle of the busiest part of the camp). This area is now a veritable wasteland--a garbage-strewn dirt lot covered with bulldozer tracks. 

   

Outside Jungle Books

Bert and I were the first volunteers to arrive and it took us a few minutes to find the right place. The makeshift building was dark inside but warm, with a few young men huddled around the power strip charging their phones and a more formal English lesson taking place in the corner. I started to chat to a few guys from Afghanistan, including a sixteen-year-old who made the journey completely on his own and was applying for asylum in the UK to join his uncles in Lewisham. I asked if they spoke Urdu (they did), and when I busted out my basic Hindi, they went nuts, calling their friends over to hear this white lady from Amreeka say in their language that she prefers Amir Khan to Salman and Shah Rukh. They brought me tea and couldn't get enough of hearing my broken speech; it was a little overwhelming but it felt good to have an interaction that was less tired and scripted than simply me asking them to tell me their sob stories. At some point I looked over to see a Syrian guy, whom I had met a few minutes prior, stamping on a plastic milk crate to break it into smaller pieces. My confusion only lasted a few seconds, as he then began shoving the pieces into the wood-burning stove. Horrified, I cried out for him to stop, saying, "It's poison to burn that! Please don't!" He just looked at me with a side smile and said, "This? This is wood, made from trees. It burns very well." As the small, dark space filled with the choking smell and smoke from burned plastic, I reflected on this place, so set apart from the city and the European outside world.

 Life in the camp in some ways seemed shockingly normal, especially after being there for a few days. 

There are churches and mosques throughout the camp, as well as a library, a youth center, restaurants, shops. several schools, medical clinics, and spaces designated for games like dominoes, where people watch as actively as they play.

Shops like this dot the camp, often stocked with cheaper goods bought in Belgium.

This guy from Afghanistan runs a small store. He buys tobacco in bulk, along with what look like cigarettes without tobacco. He uses a small mechanical device to fill them and then sells them ten at a time, wrapped in tinfoil.

Restaurants such as this one, the Three Idiots, cater largely to the European volunteers who can afford to buy food. 

This fantastic meal cost €5 per person. The fried chicken was DELISH.

One of the Idiots. The proprietors are Pakistani and took great pleasure at my feeble Hindi.

Two British women run this community space which provides daily yoga and acupuncture,
as well as a quiet area in which to congregate

British actress Juliet Stevenson visited the Jungle and was disturbed by the lack of resources and public spaces designated for women. She bought this double decker bus and had it repurposed to house a school on the top floor and a women's center on the lower deck. Afterwards, people crowdfunded to pay her back.

Artistic graffiti peeks out in unexpected places

The underpass below the notorious road leading to the port. It is from this road that migrants attempt to stow away on trucks that board the ferries. Dozens of people have died attempting to cross the English channel this way, as well as on foot through the Channel Tunnel.

The UK government paid for the double layer of barbed wire fencing that lines the road.

Banksy mural, of course. I assume Steve Jobs was chosen as the subject because his father was a Syrian immigrant.

A friend told me that the Arabic text says "I miss you," transliterated.

Ten gold stars to whoever can translate the Arabic text.

"Maybe this whole situation will just sort itself out."

How strange to be back in a world where my back isn't sore, where I spend money on things I don't really need, where my travel is uninhibited by my citizenship (well, mostly). It's hard to believe I spent such a short amount of time there, considering how much of my thoughts are currently occupied by the experience. A friend I made who spends pretty much all of her days off volunteering there explained how useless she feels when not in Calais, how her sense of purpose has become intimately tied to her voluntary work with refugees. And as much as I believe in the work being done there by smart, highly capable, kind people, it breaks my heart how short term this solution is, how little concern there is for the people in the camp among those with power to change the situation. I think of the smaller shantytowns I see every day in Oakland under the freeways, of the countless undocumented children that have been migrating to the US from Central America over the past several decades, jumping on trains north and enduring the cruelest of conditions in a desperate search for basic safety. The scale of what is happening in Calais and throughout Europe cannot be denied and should not be ignored. But in the grand scheme of things, is it really so different from what has been happening all along?

Eritrean church that was left standing during the evictions

What you can do

For information and to hear testimonies collected by a friend of mine and other volunteers in Vial, a camp on Chios in Greece that serves as a first point of entry, visit:

https://insidevial.wordpress.com/

To donate money, time, or food to the Refugee Community Kitchen, where I volunteered, visit:

https://refugeecommunitykitchen.com/how-you-can-help/

To donate money to Calais Kitchens, which supplies refugees in Calais and Dunkirk with nonperishable ingredients so they can cook for themselves, visit:

https://mydonate.bt.com/fundraisers/calaiskitchens

To donate money or to learn more about the umbrella organization that coordinates the majority of humanitarian operations in the Jungle, visit:

http://www.helprefugees.org.uk/

The random nature of good fortune was never so starkly apparent to me as when I returned by car across the French border into England, after barely two minutes of examination by border control, onto a train that crosses the Channel in half an hour. This is the world we live in, where for reasons rooted in history, racism, privilege and power, I have the physical freedom to cross almost any border I please while so many others cannot.

Forbidden Territory

Going to Kashmir brought up some mixed feelings for me, as it was the place to which my roommate, Patricia, travelled, prompting the Fulbright program to unceremoniously kick her out. But so many people have told me throughout the year that it is the most beautiful place in India, and its status as disputed territory gave me an indication that this place was special enough to fight over. I was also excited to explore Kashmir with Sári, who spent time there before and had a good friend with whom we could stay. Before we went to Rajasthan, we bought train tickets at the Foreign Tourist Reservation Bureau, an air conditioned heaven within the madness of the New Delhi train station, the largest and most used in India. About 24 hours after returning from Rajasthan, Sári and I were on the move again, taking an auto to the metro, a metro to the train, and an overnight train to Jammu, the southernmost city of the state of Jammu and Kashmir. For the first time, I was traveling overnight in sleeper class, the unairconditioned equivalent of steerage (yes, the image I have in my head is from the movie Titanic), with bunk-beds stacked three on each side of the berth. We arrived in the morning and boarded a shared jeep that would drive the ten hour journey to the city of Srinagar. 

View from the journey from Jammu to Srinagar

Not. Comfortable. To ride. For 11 hours.

Dal Lake from across the street from Farooz's house

Unfortunately, we were the last to join the car, so Sári and I shared the back of the car with two other guys, on seats that faced each other, Sári's long legs crumpled and folded as small as they could go. Despite the discomfort, the ride was absolutely stunning, winding around the mountains and overlooking lush valleys with mountain streams. At one point all the cars were stopped on the highway for an hour, as we waited for a goatherder to get his flock through the mountain tunnel we needed to pass through. By the time we reached Srinagar an hour later than we expected (thanks to the goats), it had started to rain and was nearly dark. We shoved into one of Srinagar's black autos, closed on both sides to keep the cold out, but making you feel like you were trapped in a jewelry box on wheels. Around Dal Lake we drove, admiring the sunset through the rain and arriving 15 minutes later at Farooz's house on the other side of the lake. He and his father met us outside; we crossed the wooden footbridge leading past the greenhouse in front and into the simple sitting area at the front of the house. The most notable thing about the room, in which the entire family was congregated to watch the news and chat, was that it was absent of furniture. Everyone sat on the floor on the room's periphery, their long, poncho-like ferins covering their knees and insulating the heat released from the congars, small baskets filled with hot coals for exactly this purpose. Farooz's mom, thrilled to see Sári again, bustled around, rattling off in Kashmiri as if we could understand her clear as day, and bringing us kahva, traditional Kashmiri tea. Farooz's sister, Seyde, sat with her seventeen-day-old infant, alternating between nursing and rocking. We were treated to a piping hot dinner, consisting of vegetables flavored with turmeric and pressure-cooked to death, and, as always in Kashmir, an overly generous helping of rice. In Kashmir, they say if you haven't had rice, you haven't had a meal. We ate the way everyone eats there: with our hands, a skill I had fortunately already been taught by one of my students when I visited her house. If you're wondering why you need to learn to eat with your hands, I recommend you try eating rice with your hands and tell me how it goes. 

Farooz's mom tills the land

According to Farooz, the bureaucracy in Kashmir makes the rest of India look like a well-oiled machine. As a result, it's very difficult to get permits to do things like build houses on your own land, so Farooz's family took advantage of a government strike to build their home quickly, on the sly. The hasty building is barely insulated, making it pretty drafty and cold; Sári and I shared a room upstairs that we occupied only when we were under the covers. The absence of furniture is consistent throughout the house, with everyone sleeping on thin handmade mattresses on the floor and one room downstairs with shelves where the whole family keeps their possessions. Indeed, all the bedrooms were devoid of anything except for the mattresses on the floor. When Sári told Farooz she was cold, he went to get a hot water bottle and came back with an actual plastic bottle that once held cooking oil, filled with hot water. There was also only one bathroom for in the house, which included Farooz, his younger brother, his parents, his grandmother who looked about 16738462 years old, and his sister, who was abiding by the tradition stating that a woman returns to her mother's house just before and for a few months after giving birth. The bathroom included a squatter and a nearby spout, with a bucket placed underneath for bathing purposes. The great thing was that they had really hot water at all times of the day (don't know how, but it was awesome), so taking a bucket shower was really not unpleasant despite the morning chill. 

Mehru and Farooz chow down 

For our first full day, Farooz took us to the market near the holy shrine of Hazrat Bal, a mosque which is said to house a beard hair of the Prophet Muhammad. It was drizzling off and on all day, but the walk to Hazrat Bal was beautiful, the placid Dal Lake reflecting the sky as clearly as any mirror. Farooz took us to a bakery where we ate cream-filled pastries and rested from the rain before taking a minibus to Lal Chowk, a shopping area with a Sunday Market. The market consisted of used items from clothes to books, to dishes. Sári and I wore ferins that Farooz's mother had lent us, reducing the staring to less even than what it would be elsewhere in India. In the evening, we relaxed at the house and met Farooz's hilarious, too-clever-for-her-own-good three and a half year-old niece, Mehru. 

Ferin!

Paper maché madness at Khanqah Shah-i Hamadan

The next day, Sári and I headed for the Old City, saw the Jama Masjid (Friday Mosque) in all its glory, wandered the streets admiring the unique, wooden architecture and spending hours looking for the Khanqah Shah-i-Hamadan shrine, said to be the nicest in Srinagar. When we eventually arrived via auto, we were not disappointed. The entire façade and inner walls and ceilings are covered with decorative paper maché, bursting with bright color and intricate, hand-painted motifs. We started chatting with an older man working outside the mosque to welcome people, who was so impressed with my Hindi (Urdu) that he took us around and led us inside to where the women pray, a part of the mosque where foreigners and non-Muslims are not technically allowed. He was fascinated by my jewelry, asking me where I got each piece, and testing the stones to check their purity. He introduced us to every person we saw as we walked around the mosque, each person stopping to marvel at my limited Urdu and expressing their excitement at meeting me. When the namaz sounded and people began filing in to pray, a man who seemed to be homeless and drunk tried to gain access to the mosque, only to be physically escorted off the premises several times. The shrine was guarded by several Indian soldiers, which made for a somewhat strained atmosphere in the first place; then to see this old man being manhandled was pretty disturbing, even if he was drunk. 

Transplanting

We spent the next day helping Farooz and his family on the farm, transplanting seedlings that they  had grown from seeds by placing them with dirt in small plastic bags for sale. I warned Farooz about my black thumb, my unique talent for killing plants I try to cultivate, but he said it would be fine. Keep your fingers crossed! Farooz's mom commented that it usually takes farmers years to get a bent back, but that I had managed to acquire one in just a day! In the evening, we went down the road with Farooz and his cousin for kebabs, which consisted of a stick holding bite-zed pieces of meat, roti (bread) and fresh chutney on the side. Delicious! Though the food we ate at the house was not bad, I was completely tired of it after a few days and was anxious to eat something else. In the evening, we tagged along with John and Mehru to some festival celebrated in a few noteworthy cemeteries to commemorate Muslim saints buried there. It was pretty overwhelming, with so much staring and such huge crowds, but it was definitely interesting to witness. 

Pari Mahal

On Wednesday we did errands, spending a lazy morning and then running around making arrangements to get back to Delhi. No sooner did we buy train tickets from Jammu to Delhi (no trains go to Srinagar), did we discover that the entire highway between Jammu and Srinagar would be closed due to government ministers moving from their winter locale in Jammu to their summer workplace in Srinagar. So flying it would have to be! In the afternoon, Farooz took us to the Pari Mahal, a Mughal garden overlooking the whole city and lake. Much to my dismay, we walked the 2.5km uphill road to the site, watching the tour buses and vans zooming by. The view was incredible, and they were filming some kind of music video so there was music blaring, which made for an unusually funny atmosphere. It began to POUR rain and then hail on the way back, so the car that stopped for us to get in to take us to the nearest sheltered bus stop was surely a divine intervention.

Goat milking!!!

On Thursday, I milked a goat! I went with Farooz and his mother and squeezed the milk out of the teat! It was epic. Later, as we walked to Hazrat Bal to buy flight tickets, Farooz's brother, Irshad spotted us from his scooter on his way home from work, which it turned out he didn't have that day. He borrowed his brother-in-law's car and took us all around the valley, showing us some incredible places that I would never have gone on my own. What a gift it was to be taken around like that, to see the poppies and irises growing wild on the mountainside, meet nomadic tribespeople out for a stroll, spend time in the much-missed sunshine. Their cousin came along as well, which gave us the opportunity to talk about life in Kashmir, to ask their opinions about the situation and the future for the region. Most of what they said was thoughtful and unsurprising, but every once in a while they would say something so contrary to my frame of mind that it was hard to hold back my judgment. The most notable example of this was when the cousin claimed that the only rape that occurs in Kashmir is perpetrated by the Indian Army, that Kashmiris never rape. I asked him if he really thought that Kashmir was the only place in the world without rape, and he replied that Kashmiris would just never do such a thing, that women are respected in a way they are not in other places. This coming from a native of a city where maybe half the women we saw wore full burkas. The naïveté this displayed was not shocking, but rather echoed what I have heard in many parts of India, that their region, their people, their way of life is superior and somehow free of many of the contemporary issues that plague other societies.

Shikara walla?

Sunset on the lake

Dinner on the lake

In the evening, despite being tired from the wonderful day of sightseeing, Sári and I decided to go for a ride in a shikara, the traditional, wooden longboats propelled by a man rowing with a single, heart shaped paddle in the back. Farooz balked at this idea and said he was taking us on the lake himself, and disappeared for a few minutes before returning with a bag full of kebabs. He took us to his family's boat from which his father used to sell vegetables at the floating vegetable market, Farooz rowed to the middle of the lake and we turned in circles, watching the water become golden with the sunset and then fade into purple and black as the sun sank, eventually dotted with the jewels of lights reflected from Hazrat Bal. We ate our kebabs, making a mess and letting the juice from the chutney run down our fingers and chins, watching fisherman catch "illegal fish," as Farooz says, by casting nets into the water at night to collect in the morning, laughing and feeling the loveliness of the moment. It was truly a highlight of the trip.

It was on Friday, the Muslim day of prayer, that the political tension was most remarkable. There seemed to be more police and soldiers on the street than usual; we saw a police truck on Lal Chowk being loaded with madly chanting people being arrested for protesting, and Farooz said the same thing happened as he was entering the mosque. It's hard to imagine this beautiful city under one of their relatively frequent curfews, in which no one is allowed on the streets until further notice. The military presence is hugely resented by Kashmiris, who are outnumbered by members of the Indian Army. Everyone we spoke to expressed a deep dislike for India and a desire to separate from the nation, though no one communicated wanting to be a part of Pakistan either. There were things about the situation that reminded me of Israel, in the presence of weapons in plain sight nearly everywhere you go, the sense of tension about the possibility of unrest and the feeling that the political situation was caused and perpetuated by forces outside their personal control or influence. The major difference, however, was the sense of occupation, the fact that none of the soldiers are from Kashmir, that they don't belong in or to this land. 

Seyde and baby

It poured all day on Friday, which didn't stop me and Sári from exploring the Friday markets at Lal Chowk and Hazrat Bal, pausing for coffee at a bookstore, buying postcards for our friends from Corrymeela and exploring the shops selling Kashmiri crafts. Farooz took us around the food bazaar outside of Hazrat Bal mosque after he finished praying, and we admired the piles of kohlrabi, the kilos of grapes draped over carts, the whole, skinned goats hanging from meat hooks in front of the butchers. In the evening we sat inside, listening to the rain, drinking kahva, keeping the congars secure under the ferins, taking turns holding the baby while she napped. 

Farooz, Irshad and nieces

Fun in Nishat Bagh 

We had all morning in Srinagar on Saturday before our flight, so we took advantage of the rain's pause to go to the two famous Mughal gardens, Shalimar Bagh and Nishat Bagh, both impressive in their own way. Nishat Bagh, though less famous outside of Kashmir, is breathtaking, set up overlooking the lake in terraced gardens bisected by a series of waterfall fountains. It was a great way to spend our last few hours, taking silly pictures and people-watching. Even the sun came out to send us off! We returned to the house for lunch and then said warm goodbyes to the family as we got in to auto to the airport. Words can't describe how grateful I am to have been able to stay with them, what a meaningful, beautiful experience they gave me in Kashmir. They told me I always have a place to stay there, that I should come visit soon, that they will miss me. People that genuinely kind and hospitable are nothing less than a blessing. 

Nishat Bagh

To see the rest of my photos from Kashmir, click here.

It was the best possible way to end this beautiful year in India. I have been staying with my friend Sim, who is from here but went to Scripps with me, and have been chatting with her a lot, processing my experience and gaining some closure. I have such a deep sense of gratitude, mostly to my roommates, the other ETAS and to the students and teachers at school, who were the people who completely made this year what it was. I am proud of myself for making it through with such a positive attitude, for rolling with the punches, learning what I could and letting go of what I couldn't control. Though the truth is that I think there are much better fellowships on which to come to India in terms of support, purpose and organization, I leave this experience with a deep personal satisfaction about my time here, and whether or not that comes from a completely internal place, I am equally happy about my year here and ready to move on.

I fly this evening to Southeast Asia, Where Iwill be traveling for the next three months, hoping to make a loop through Northern Thailand, Cambodia, Laos, Vietnam and maybe Burma, before visiting my good friend Roland in the Philippines and ending my journey in Australia. I fly to San Francisco on August 8th and will be visiting all my favorite people there before returning to New York for a few weeks and attending a master's program in England (haven't decided which yet!) for conflict resolution. I will try to blog during my upcoming travels but any regularity is doubtful, so sit tight! Sending much love for the last time from glorious Mother India. And what a Mother she is.