New York City - Bangalore - Cape Town - Buenos Aires
New York City Letter Home
Letters from a Footprint
Footprints define where we have been in life. They follow us; they run after us. Even if we can not see them, they are there. Footprints leave a lasting impression, while feet simply leave. Hence, the series of letters that will follow will take on such a lasting impression.
Dear Taylor Made,
My feet hurt! I have been walking all over the place! International Honors Program has begun and I have just landed in Bangalore, India after two fabulous weeks in New York City, USA.
The group is composed of me and 23 other students, two professors, and one Trustees Fellow (who is like a Teacher Assistant/Group Coordinator). Each student has brought a host of stories and interests and I simply cannot wait to entertain more of them. For now, I should perhaps tell you what I spent time doing in New York City.
Upon arrival from the airport, I decided to check out the city and I walked several blocks until I just could not haul my luggage any longer. Looking back, the taxi ride from a random city block to our dorm was indicative of what the program would be like. That is, I have learned from visual and audio observations and asking questions to get from point A to B. During Agency and Neighborhood Days, for example, about five other students and I were challenged with the task of learning about neighborhoods and organizations by asking the “right” questions. When at United Healthcare Workers East, I learned that simply asking when a trade union was established and whom it was purposed to help was only the tip of the iceberg. How the mission of the union has shifted to address current issues is a much better question to gauge the impact that agencies have on surrounding communities. We spent much of one afternoon walking up and down and up and back down steps (to reduce our ecological footprint!) to visit offices and speak to workers in their environment. Another day, we spent time in a community in upper Manhattan, Washington Heights. Walking around the neighborhood meant taking in the sights of diverse housing, sounds of many languages, and smells of street vendors of a community composed largely of immigrants. We walked by shops whose owners were challenged with rising rent costs and changing community needs. We tapped our feet to the sounds of salsa, meringue, and reggaeton as we stopped to observe how a local community center incorporates the neighborhood’s children. Eventually, these new findings were presented and discussed with the entire class.
While in New York, these feet that I wear also visited other sites such as the Tenement Museum, the United Nations, Battery Park City Park, and most memorably, the route to Leonia, New Jersey in order to enjoy a barbeque at Hans and Ellie Spiegel’s home (former IHP City Coordinators). Ahh, the sight of New York’s sky line as we walked across the George Washingtin Bridge was quite surreal. I had a chance to become better acquainted with the other students. I even connected with onlookers (those unfortunate motorists stuck in traffic and envious of our freedom to enjoy the bridge) who cheered us on along our way. Ironically, I remember having thought that walking such a long distance of six miles was insane! Yet now, my feet have never felt more accomplished.
So, I feel that this program was made just for me. I attempt to appreciate each lecture by traveling faculty or guest speaker, field visit, or group bonding experience as something from which I can gather new information. I try to engage in conversations with students that are from colleges and universities throughout the US, China, and Canada.
Our final week was spent at a retreat center about an hour west of Auckland. There we celebrated our successful semester together and spent some time reflecting on and integrating all we learned along the way. Students pulled the strings and stories from the different countries together into a powerful final presentation that incorporated personal narrative, dance, music and theater.
I think that Bangalore will be a continuation of my experience in NYC; however, Taylor Made, I have noticed that people in Bangalore dress their feet with rings. If I were you, I would start looking forward to life on the streets of Jayanagar.
‘Til the next time,
A Footprint
Bangalore, India Letter Home
Dear Taylor Made,
We landed in Bangalore, India at the beginning of the Hindu festival of Ganesha and Gowri, the gods who have complete control over any and all obstacles. In Bangalore, the festival is less gregarious than in other parts of India, with families choosing private celebrations. Still, I was adorned with bangles and bindis (a small red dot placed in the center of my forehead). We ate delicious foods such as masala rice, guava and candies, and I danced, visited temples, where I learned how how to give pooja or praise, and I helped to sink the clay idols in the river in preparation for their believed return next year. What an awesome welcome to Bangalore! The following weeks would prove to be as welcoming and even more insightful.
In India, we learned in real time from and as things were happening around us. Our faculty cultivated what we observed daily on the walks to and from school, museums, parks, or busy street markets and brought it into the classroom. For example, in our anthropology course, Culture and Society, our professor, Mieka Ritsema, addressed the notion of festival and celebration in the Indian context and touched on how they are celebrated in South Africa and Argentina. In turn, we discussed how religious celebrations are treated and connected to our home countries of China, Mexico, and the U.S. In Politics and Development, our professor Sudha Mohan who is an Indian national introduced democracy and how it functions in post-colonial India. We learned about Public Interest Litigation (PIL) that NGOs and private citizens can file on behalf of those whose rights are violated.
A few days later, in our Contemporary Urban Issues course which is taught by our Bangalore coordinators, Leo Saldanha and Bhargavi Rao, we discussed how their NGO, the Environmental Support Group (ESG) has filed a PIL related to land and water rights. Many of us were eager to see this legal battle, imagining our coordinator standing in front of a judge and pleading his case with all of his papers and staff behind him! In order to give us an opportunity to see this democracy in action, our professors changed the afternoon schedule so that we could visit either the magistrate, civil, or high court! The next day, after our visits to court, we compared and discussed our observations. We even mimicked our teacher’s reaction to the judge and being the only Indian man not dressed in proper cloak! We were thrilled to witness an issue discussed in the course and captured in our readings.
Case studies are an opportunity to explore a subject on our own in some depth, The topics addressed waste management, water rights, transportation, and farming lands. We honed our ethnographic tools as we learned from so many sources, from professionals to home stay families, experts of all kinds. We practiced Kannada (the local language spoken in Karnataka state/Bangalore city) in order to offer the greeting Namaskara! and use public transportation such as buses, auto taxis, and auto-rickshaws (three-wheeled taxis). We left our footprint on Bangalore’s economy purchasing flowers from street vendors, and bargaining at street markets for sarees, idols, crafts, jewelry and spices. Eventually, many of us even began to bathe with Mysore sandalwood soap!
Each interaction meant a chance to hear a different perspective including the farmer forced to move to the city as the demand for his crop becomes less and the desire for his land becomes greater. We listened to a population that does not trust their governing system. We left footprints in the offices of many government officials, NGO and private industry workers, unionists, scrap pickers, and women entrepreneurs as we engaged in dialogue about Bangalore’s problems, solutions, and projected future. There was never a dull day!
With all of these things going on, you might think that we didn’t have time to enjoy each other or explore on our own. Weekends were as busy as the weeks! One weekend the entire group was invited to a wedding that captured traits of both southern and northern Indian weddings. We dressed in traditional clothes, received henna on our hands, arms, and feet, and were photographed as if we were part of the immediate family. Another weekend, most of the group visited Pondicherry, a six-hour drive to one of India’s most unspoiled beaches. Another weekend, students reported that hiking Nandi Hills was ten times better than running on the beaches of Pondicherry! Others indicated that the beauty of Mysore, the historic center of India, and Bhannerghatta Park were simply not to be missed. Student-organized visits to Goldman Sachs and the Indian Stock Exchange as well as the hit movie Rock On! and King Lear gave even more opportunities for students to compare notes.
So, Taylor Made, with the memory of walking the streets of Bangalore, stopping for a coffee or tea break along the way to destinations, the sound of a horn indicating it’s okay to pass, and coming home to freshly prepared dosas, I can not help but smile and turn my premature nostalgia into fuel to read the city of Cape Town, South Africa. I hear that they use their feet to march and dance to the sounds of drums of freedom songs.
‘Til the next time,
A Footprint
Cape Town, South Africa Letter Home
Dear Taylor Made,
Within days of arrival, several students and I strapped on hiking boots and hiked to the top of Table Mountain! As I climbed further and further from the city, my body’s reaction to the change in elevation was akin to my mind’s racing reaction to adjusting to a third new environment; one that is at once an island of familiarity surrounded by two oceans filled with incredible and diverse history and culture. From the top we could make out the Central Business District, the former Black Townships, juxtaposing Squatter settlements, the former Coloured neighborhood - BoKaap, the construction of the Greenpoint football (soccer) stadium, nature reserves, bays and oceans, Robben Island, and vast green space – remnants of Apartheids ubiquitous ill-famed legacy. Simply put, our panoramic view from the top of Table Mountain would foreshadow our IHP collective experience in Cape Town.
During the first week of classes we were introduced to the culture of Xhosa, the predominant ethnic group of Cape Town´s Black South African population. We lived with host families in Langa (Xhosa for sun), the oldest Black township and the closest township to the city. We learned first hand how Apartheid affected the nation via panel discussion featuring several members of our host families, our country coordinator Mr. Chris Colvin, and two guest lecturers. One day a lady that was old enough to be everyone’s great grandmother displayed the traditional Xhosa dress, hopped on the floor as she played an imaginary local version of hopscotch, and composed a beat with her hands as she grabbed a few students to dance along with her. It was awesome! After such introductions and coupled with a number of documentaries on Apartheid´s history, we were able to engage with our families not only on a social level, but also one that encompassed our historical understandings.
The next week, we were introduced to Coloured and Indian/Malay culture, the predominant population of the BoKaap. In Afrikaans, the language spoken in the community, “Bo” means up and “Kaap” means town. We delved into topics such as HIV/AIDS, the housing crisis, xenophobia, and present leadership. Seemingly, South Africans of all racial backgrounds are aware of both international and domestic current events, as one can not help but read headlines on newspapers pinned intermittently to light posts and trees aligning the roads.
We all discovered that living with different homestay families meant understanding these current events in a variety of ways. Thus, the transition from Langa to the BoKaap was a period of discovery as we all began to see and attempt to understand their cultural, social, and political differences. In Langa, for example, from talking to my host brother to having conversations at neighborhood fish ‘n chips stands, the news of the ANC’s (African National Congress’) threatening separation was met with confusion, dismay, and even a bit of optimism. On the other hand, in the BoKaap, from conversations with my host Umie (Afrikaans for grandmother) to talking with our neighbors, I learned that many in this community felt the ANC’s separation did not involve them and as such the news was met with lethargy, confusion, and seemingly less optimism than their Langa counterparts.
According to the curator at the BoKaap museum, national changes in South Africa were not directly made for the so-called Coloured (the South African term for people of mixed descent) population. Pulling my hand close to her, she singled out the middle finger on my hand and contended that during Apartheid, the so-called English white and Afrikaans were the thumb and pointer fingers, respectively, and the Blacks and Indians were the pinky and ring fingers, respectively. Policies post Apartheid, she said while turning my hand over, only meant a shift in power dynamics for the so-called Black and White populations; and the virtually untouched middle finger, the plight of the so-called Coloured South African, unnoticed and unaddressed.
The political, economic, and social current events occurring in and around Cape Town proved incubator for our case studies and neighborhood days. Our case study groups focused on the World Cup 2010, Housing Crisis, HealthCare-HIV/AIDS, and the Energy Crisis. A theme of interconnectivity was evident within the issues researched. In the efforts to prepare the city to be a stellar host for the next World Cup, funding has been provided to CBOs (Community Based Organizations) to secure formal housing and remove squatter settlements from the city’s entrances, as well as to NGOs (Non-Government Organizations) in efforts to increase HIV/AIDS awareness, education, and decrease its prevalence. During presentations, the group that focused on the Energy Crisis showed us a still clip from a popular soap opera with an energy alert running at the bottom. The alert prompted viewers to use less energy as the supply of power was limited while the demand was great. The group concluded that alerts like this would form habits and keep Cape Townians aware of their energy consumption – something that could eventually conserve resources necessary when thousands of World Cup 2010 fans flood the city and demand an even greater amount of power. During the stadium tour with my group, I discovered that this stadium will leave a tremendous footprint even after 2010 has run away.
Thus, the assignments given by our Culture and Society (C&S) professor, Dr. Mieka Ritsema, and our Politics and Development (P&D) professor, Dr. Sudha Mohan have empowered us to synthesize what we are learning as we try our hand at IHP’s mission – to enable one to read a city. In C&S class, our assignment is to select an aspect of a city and observe its changing presence in the site visits and in everyday life in each city that we visit. I, of course, chose to select the object of feet or footprints as I feel that a person’s feet tell where they have been, where they are, and where they are going. Some students chose to focus on street performances, public exercise, access to libraries, transportation, weddings, and fitness centers. And the graduate students chose to focus in-depth on more specific issues, such as the stimulus behind women entrepreneurs in cities, the toleration of conflicting religions in democratic societies, and the restructure of pre-school or early education in cities. For our P&D assignment, we were challenged with the task of producing a debate over the topic of the ANC’s potential separation. After researching the history of the ANC, I found the debate to be rewarding as I was able to hear and participate in arguments assessing and questioning its uncertain future.
Taylor, if only I could capture my experience in Cape Town on one post card! I would include interesting pictures of the people we spoke to during our case studies and neighborhood days; the visit to the United States Consulate; the Penguin Colony; the hike up Table Mountain; bikes and wines tasting tour; and vacation spent along the Garden Route, on Safari in Kruger National Park, at the Beach near Simon’s Town, and Europe with friends and family. I would even include a chronology of pictures capturing our varying moods as most of us spent all night in anticipation watching the race for the U.S. presidency from different locations. And the picture of everyone’s 6:00 am reaction to President-elect Barak Obama’s victory would be the post card’s signature! It was simply an eye-opening experience to witness such an historic event from abroad, especially in post-Apartheid South Africa. So Taylor Made, as there is no room left on this post card, I guess the post card’s stamp would have to be a picture of an Argentinean Zapateria, (Spanish for shoe store). I hear that they use their feet to dance to the elegant sounds of Tango.
‘Til the next time,
A Footprint
Buenos Aires, Argentina Letter Home
Dear Taylor Made,
After a much needed vacation in South Africa, we arrived to our final city stop - Buenos Aires, Argentina - ready to practice our skills and developing abilities to read, deconstruct, and analyze a city. The drive from the airport to downtown allowed us a glimpse of the city’s vast architectural display of history and religious identity as well as the city’s housing developments, graffiti, billboards, and traffic. Superficially, Buenos Aires seemed familiar and comfortable, but, as in all places, we learned that to understand the city better, one must look for its unique aspects deceptively hiding in plain sight.
We spent the first weekend at the Buenos Aires Una Empresa Nacional (BAUEN): Cooperativa de Trabajo (Cooperative of Work), before moving in with our host families. The BAUEN is located on one of the heaviest traveled (and advertised-on!) avenues of the city. The BAUEN appeared to be an ordinary hotel with a great location and friendly staff. However, we soon discovered its remarkable history from informational plaques and our Country Coordinator, Senora Carolina Rovetta. It is one of many business enterprises “retaken” by former employees in the aftermath of the 2001 economic crisis when owners shut the doors. As with so many seemingly ordinary and familiar aspects of this city, this was our first chapter in what would be a novel of discoveries.
Our meeting place was the centrally located Sociedad del Cultura de Arquitecturos (Cultural Society of Architects), but we were quickly out into the city, visting the neighborhoods (or barrios in Spanish) of Caballito, San Isidro, La Boca, and San Telmo in the first few days. Starting with Neighborhood Day, we began to learn that social divisions, often quite apparent in Bangalore and Cape Town, are much less visible in Buenos Aires. The financial crisis affected people of all classes, and the effects are still felt. Skin color, gender, hair, neighborhood, and other superficial characteristics are not reliable indicators of financial status here. This is true from the heart of the city to the neighborhoods on the periphery such as La Mantanza, to the provincial capital of La Plata, and to estancias or ranches in the countryside.
Buenos Aires captures the European heritage of many of its settlers; indeed it was known as the Paris of South America. Porteños (residents of Buenos Aires, a port city) are known to consider themselves more European than South American. The city is dense, filled with gracious early 20th century buildings reminiscent of their counterparts in Europe. Restaurants and cafes are ubiquitous and the shops are filled with everything from high fashion to hardware. Book stores can be found on almost every block, reflecting a literary culture and the city’s history as a publishing center. In contrast to this rich urban panorama, we traveled to a suburban gated community, Nordelta, where an entirely different kind of community is being created. We had the benefit of being guided by, Pedro Pesci, who was our professor for Urban Planning and Sustainable Environments. He told us the curious history of this development. Originally planned by his firm to be an inclusive, diverse and densely planned development well connected to the adjacent city of Tigre, it had evolved it had evolved into something quite different.
Reminiscent of communities in suburban America, familiar to many of us, Nordelta is a wealthy enclave of low-density housing, automobile dependency and segregated land uses. Is this the inevitable phase of new development in Buenos Aires, or will the current global crisis reshuffle the cards?
For Porteños, tango is more than a dance, it is a symbol of local pride, collective organization, and artistic expression. Most days, one can find an amateur group dancing tango on one of the Avenida Florida, the crowded and famous downtown pedestrian street. We took a turn with dance lessons and we took advantage of many other cultural aspects of the city. While walking in the city center, we stopped to view daredevils swallowing glass and busting bottles in Guinness Book of World Records ways. Parks were filled with sounds of live bands showcasing upcoming talent or providing an excellent venue to fundraise or raise awareness about issues of HIV or labor policies. On Sundays, many of us enjoyed the spectacle of futbol in the famous soccer stadium in the neighborhood of La Boca.
Many of us were surprised to see graffiti and murals on statues and monuments around the city until we understood it as a somewhat accepted act in this society of protest and change. On Thursdays, many of us traveled to Plaza de Mayo to witness the weekly protest of the La Ronda de Madres de Marcha or the Circle of Mothers of the Disappeared March. Every Thursday for decades, these women have joined in public demonstration to force remembrance and investigations into the disappearance of thousands of citizens who “were disappeared” during the dictatorship.
And on Thursday, November 27, we all joined around the table for a magnificent Thanksgiving feast, IHP – Buenos Aires style!
So Taylor, as this is my last Letter Home to you, I am feeling bitter sweet. On one hand, I am happy to return home in the middle of the holiday season and tell all of my family about my travels around the world. On the other hand, I am sad to be departing the embrace of 23 brothers and sisters, 1 cool aunt (Trustees Fellow), and 2 caring “moms” (Professors). Over the course of the semester, we have overcome the challenges of travel logistics, climate, upset tummies and colds, some homesickness, different social and host family norms. We have shared laughs, enjoyed vacation, marveled over academic epiphanies, and learned about ourselves. I am thankful for 16 weeks with a group of amazing individuals and know this chance comes once in a lifetime.
During the last week of the program, we traveled to a rural estancia for a retreat. We talked about what it will be like to return home and bonded one last time. I think most of us left the retreat feeling confident that we can read a city, and that we can come up with an ideal model of how a city should function. Most importantly, Taylor, we realized that a functioning city requires flexibility and tenacity by a group of amazing individuals working together, cognizant of social, political, economic, and ecological footprints. Because like with footprints, the impressions and decisions we make on our societies today will still be here, even when we have gone on.
Best to you, Taylor Made! I feel like this program was made just for me and I hope that you have enjoyed walking with me along my journey to learn how to read a city.
Signed,
A Footprint
