I think that I owe India an apology...
Without really intending it, I arrived in India and soon adopted the attitude (Due to a few nasty hiccups!) that I hated it here, and secondly, that India needed to change, not me.
India has many problems. It has fairly serious environmental issues, a huge amount of poverty, opressive conditions for women and ethnic conflict. All of this is clearly on display in India.
The first time you step outside here you see smog from the congested traffic and litter everywhere (Plus the people who put it there as if it was the most natural thing in the world).
Poverty is shoved in your face. You have women holding malnourished babbies, tugging at your arm for a few rupees, or even a glass of milk for their young ones...
As a 'liberated' western woman, I am surprised to find such a small amount of other Indian women on the street. It appears such a male dominated society where women do not always have equal opportunity.
As for ethic issues... Just go and talk to a Kashmiri person about what they have had to go through over the last decade...
It is too easy to come here with a "white so gotta be right" kind of attitude without enough compassion and understanding. The realization that I made fairly recently is that westerners are in fact the ones who are living their lives in the most unsustainable way with their driving consumerism and desire to have everything bigger and better. Everything created in the western world these days seems to be created to be replaced, not to last. Why? For money of course...
Just because we cannot see the porblems in our countries as clearly as we can here, it does not mean that they are not there. There is no need for superiority!
I guess I just really wanted to thank India for putting up with the rude and grumpy me... My non-judgemental eyes are now able to see the beauty that this country has to offer me and for that I am joyful...
