Exploring My Neighborhood

Trip Start Aug 11, 2007
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Trip End Jul 30, 2008


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Saturday, October 6, 2007

Today I finally got a chance to do a little exploring of my neighborhood and found out that there are many places nearby that I had no clue existed. First, I set out to check out the nearby gym that my landlady's daughter told me about. The gym was only a 2 minute walk from my house, and when I arrived and went inside, I was greeted by an extremely enthusiastic young woman. I told her I was there to check out the gym and find out about their prices and hours. She showed me a small, but well-equipped exercise room with weight machines and treadmills, and then she led me into an office where I thought she was going to tell me about gym membership, pricing, etc. However, she seemed more interested in getting to know me and finding out why I was here in Lucknow. I told her that I was working for an NGO and she immediately chimed in that she had started an NGO herself that is working to build schools and a hospital in one of the rural districts of UP. She asked me what I was doing at my NGO and I told her that I was doing research and some capacity-building around women's reproductive health. She then told me that she was very interested in getting funding from the U.S., and asked me to tell her how long an NGO had to be operating to apply for U.S. grants. I explained that I was not that knowledgeable about international funding options from U.S. foundations, but offered her some good foundation-based websites to check out for information.

After leaving the gym, I made my way towards the vegetable stalls and the dairy that are about a 10-minute walk from my house. I also planned to get a box of sweets for my landlady, since today was her birthday. Rather than getting right to my food shopping, I decided to explore the several shops around the dairy and came upon a small shop called "Gujurati Government Emporium" with textiles and carved wooden pieces in the window. Government Emporiums are run by the government of the province whose crafts they sell, and these shops are known to be reasonably priced and have a great selection of handicrafts and textiles from the provinces they represent. I went in and began looking at the beautiful, block-painted fabrics on the shelves. While I was browsing, an older woman struck up a conversation with me, and it turns out that her husband is the director of the Lucknow UNICEF office and they live nearby! Hopefully I'll run into her again, since I'd love to find out more about UNICEF's work in UP. I ended up buying a nice piece of fabric to use as a bed sheet, and also splurged on a beautifully-dyed kameez (long shirt).

I left the Gujarati shop and went to buy groceries, returning home when I couldn't carry anything more. It must have been particularly hot today, because I fixed myself some lunch when I got back and then was suddenly overcome with tiredness and had to take a nap!

In the afternoon, Sharon came over and we went to the National Book Fair in Lucknow. I had gone with my landlady and her daughter on Thursday after work, but there were so many stalls to see and so many cheap, used books from the U.S. (how they got to India, I don't know) that I had to go back for a second day! I bought 5 more books (to add to the 5 I bought on Thursday), for a total of 10 books for $10...not bad for the books I got...all relatively recent, NY Times Bestsellers or Prize Winners. Now I just have to do a lot of reading to get through all the books I bought.
That night, my landlady invited me to join her family for dinner, since it was her birthday. She cooked delicious dal, a spicy chicken dish, chicken tikka, and rumali roti (crepe-like pancakes that are used to scoop up the dal). My landlady kept offering me more food (as I knew she would), but she eventually understood when I told her that I was too full and could not eat any more.
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