The littlest birds...

Today was my last day in the office with SLC-IT.  I wish I could say I was sad but, unfortunately, today couldn’t have come soon enough!  I am at the ending stages of my final report for them, now at 54 pages and still a few more to go!  I’ve been dragging my feet at finishing – very unlike me, I’ve never been much of a procrastinator but it seems India has made one out of me.  I will finish the report up and then wash my hands of it all!  And I am particularly excited because my brother and Ryan are currently en route to Leh and arrive tomorrow morning to start two weeks of pure adventure... finally the holiday I have needed!

I suppose its natural, when experiences are ending, to reflect back on what I’ve learned here and what I will take away with me when I go back.  It’s been no secret that this internship has gone much differently than hoped.  If there is anything that has been further enforced in me, it’s adaptability.  Luckily, I began as a pretty malleable person but this project and internship has further shown me the concept of ‘making plans and having them go your way’ is not based in reality - despite efforts for it to be.  To say the least, it has been a self-made summer.  Maybe I came with unrealistic expectations of being taken under the wing by SLC-IT and that this project would be a collaborative effort.  I wasn’t and it hasn’t.  There have been moments where I have felt a victim of circumstance.  I know people who live their lives as victims, and it’s very unattractive and exhausting to be around.  I refuse the victim mentality!

I told a friend once that I believed life could be boiled down to definitions.  The question ‘what am I defined by?’ haunts me.  At times, I have felt insignificant and a failure.  But I have been defining significance and success by my relations with this organization and with the outcome of a project (and, lets just be honest, who is really going to ever read my 60-something page report, so what does it matter anyway!).  It’s not a circumstance problem or an organization problem; it’s a definition problem.  And it’s mine to fix.

So, I reject society’s definition of success and significance.  Time to re-define.  I expect that this will be difficult upon my return to the competitive culture that revolves around Duke.  But it’s no measure of health to be well adjusted in a profoundly sick society anyways…

Things to worry about...

I came across this letter today while procrastinating the last few paragraphs of my final report for SLC-IT.  It just so happens I found myself alone in the office today with internet - shocker! - and finding this nice little blog with lots of old letters from famous literary heroes was the highlight (and distraction...) of the day (www.lettersofnote.com).

Anywho... this letter was written by F. Scott Fitzgerald to his 11-year old daughter who was away at camp.

La Paix, Rodgers' Forge
Towson, Maryland

August 8, 1933

Dear Pie:

I feel very strongly about you doing duty. Would you give me a little more documentation about your reading in French? I am glad you are happy — but I never believe much in happiness. I never believe in misery either. Those are things you see on the stage or the screen or the printed pages, they never really happen to you in life.

All I believe in in life is the rewards for virtue (according to your talents) and the punishments for not fulfilling your duties, which are doubly costly. If there is such a volume in the camp library, will you ask Mrs. Tyson to let you look up a sonnet of Shakespeare's in which the line occurs "Lillies that fester smell far worse than weeds."

Have had no thoughts today, life seems composed of getting up aSaturday Evening Post story. I think of you, and always pleasantly; but if you call me "Pappy" again I am going to take the White Cat out and beat his bottom hard, six times for every time you are impertinent. Do you react to that?

I will arrange the camp bill.

Halfwit, I will conclude.

Things to worry about:

Worry about courage
Worry about Cleanliness
Worry about efficiency
Worry about horsemanship
Worry about. . .

Things not to worry about:

Don't worry about popular opinion
Don't worry about dolls
Don't worry about the past
Don't worry about the future
Don't worry about growing up
Don't worry about anybody getting ahead of you
Don't worry about triumph
Don't worry about failure unless it comes through your own fault
Don't worry about mosquitoes
Don't worry about flies
Don't worry about insects in general
Don't worry about parents
Don't worry about boys
Don't worry about disappointments
Don't worry about pleasures
Don't worry about satisfactions

Things to think about:

What am I really aiming at?
How good am I really in comparison to my contemporaries in regard to:

(a) Scholarship
(b) Do I really understand about people and am I able to get along with them?
(c) Am I trying to make my body a useful instrument or am I neglecting it?

With dearest love,

Daddy

Food, motorbikes, and the Dalai Lama...

Over the past week or so, I have developed a few routines that get me through my days at the office.  To start, about a week or so ago, I moved from my guesthouse to a vacant room in the office.  This was both a good and bad decision.  The good reasons for moving were mainly that it’s free, more space, and I can use the kitchen.  Using the kitchen has been key as now I can make a nice breakfast with coffee.  I was tiring of toasted white bread and jam at my guesthouse, so now I make a lovely wheat porridge with a cup of Nescafé.  Just delightful!  Despite my new amenities, I now have to ability to spend way too many hours in the office – already a place of tension – and I have lost some of the companionship of other people in the guesthouse.  But I suppose the last part is just life here now, as almost all of the good friends I have made here, have now left for home.  Life seems a bit quieter now.

My first attempt at cooking Indian food from scratch: Paneer butter masala, mixed veg raita, and homemade chapati!  SUCCESS!

Ahh, but my routines!  They have helped in breaking up the day and my time in the office.  Every morning I wake up early to make breakfast and coffee.  After that I go on a nice long walk up to the Shanti Stupa, which sits high above the town of Leh and gives a great view of the mountains.  You climb 500 steep stairs before you reach the overlook and in the mornings there are hardly any tourists making the climb.  So peace ensues and so does my daily morning meditations.  Then after my nice long walk, I return to the office to either begin working on my report for SLC-IT or read some of Ghandi’s autobiography ‘My Experiments of Truth.’  To say the least, I LOVE my slow mornings. 

Then at some point, the rest of the staff trickles in.  My days in the office now consist of tons of writing and organizing the data I collected from the surveys.  This is all made bearable by dried apricots and cashews (I’m truly addicted by both) and Star Trek.  The completion of my report will be in thanks to Captain Kirk and his brave crew on the U.S.S. Enterprise.    

After work, I go on another walk, visit my friend Stanzin at his office, and then head home to cook dinner.  Not the most exciting life I suppose, but this is what happens when you live somewhere for a while.  And, luckily, only eight more days until J.B. and Ryan come to visit and we begin our adventures.  So maybe a little quiet is needed.

But despite the ample time in the office and some quiet days, the last few weeks have been filled with new fun.  I took a motorbike trip with Stanzin and Anya (a woman from Switzerland) to Pangong Lake, which is just beautiful (and rumor that there is a Chinese submarine somewhere in the lake!).  This was the longest motorbike trip I have been on yet, about 6.5 hours each way over the 5^th highest motorable road in the world.  The ride there was amazing with incredible blue skies and perfect temperatures.  However, the way back was rainy and cold and snowing at the top of the pass.  All this would have been fine had we all come prepared for rain.  However, Anya and I only had chacos and socks, which were soaked from all the streams and rivers we had to cross on our way!  Luckily, I had mittens but Anya was gloveless and the driver. SO COLD.  I would imagine the picture of the two of us on the bike was similar to Harry and Lloyd from Dumb and Dumber entering Aspen minus the icicles, I suppose.  Regardless, a great trip and a needed break from Leh.

When we arrived back in Leh, the Dalai Lama had already begun his teachings.  So the next two mornings, I spent sitting in His Holiness’ joyous presence.  I admit, I have no clue what exactly he spoke on.  The translating was difficult to hear and understand but just sitting with the hundreds of Ladakhi’s and listening to his voice and, most especially, his laugh, was worth every moment.  I’m not Buddhist but there is no doubt in my mind that the Dalai Lama is a special and incredibly spiritual man.  And you can have nothing but reverence and respect for him. 

Whelp, nine days left on my lonesome and with SLC-IT.  Who knows what will be in store.  Certainly more apricots and cashews…