Conference

I've just returned from a Fulbright conference in Calcutta.

That, and:

http://www.defeatdiabetes.org/news/view.asp?id=52136

Cows

I am coming to realize that the greatest benefit of staying at a guesthouse where other Westerners pass through is that I'm get to practice my spiel every day-- by the time I get home, I'll be a pro at explaining what I do and why it's sweet. One issue I've gotten to polish in this manner is the importance of cows in India. Everyone likes to joke about Hindu cow-worship, but other than laughing at what seems to be irrational idolatry most travelers struggle to connect the animals freely making their way throughout the city with what they know of Hinduism. I've come across three equally compelling explanations-- without knowing Indian culture well enough to judge their accuracy, I'll just share them all.

First is the economic reality of Indian life. Milk (and its products, ghee and curd) are of critical importance to the vegetarian diet that most keep. Dung is kept for fuel and fertilizer, and oxen are used for carts. Cows eat garbage, as well. The sheer importance of the cow, then, gives it a special role.

Second is a historical argument. Indo-European languages and cultures share an obsession with the cow, an obsession that simply solidified here while it eased elsewhere. For example, Nordic cultures featured a cow as the original nourisher of humankind, and Jared Diamond convincingly showed in Collapse that Viking preference for cows as status items contributed to the failure of the Greenland colony. In English, many of our words having to do with money are descended from the concept of herds of cows-- for example, pecuniary, from peks, a cow herd. This feature of our shared heritage was simply accentuated in India (see here).

Finally, and most compellingly, is a religious interpretation. Milk, as a gift from a mother to her child, is the purest material expression of love. The cow is holy because the milk we get from it is the substance of pure love, and our need and use of that love requires appropriate respect to the producer. Indeed, Krishna is known as a 'thief of love' due to his proclivity towards stealing ghee as a child and making off with gopis (milkmaids) as a young man. In northern India, where the bhakti tradition emphasizes devotion, each of these aspects of the cow's importance tie together to affirm its holy position.

Fame v2

In case you wanted to hear my auspicious voice:

http://www.livemint.com/Articles/2009/02/10170335/The-Academic-Expat-studying-c.html

An interview with the WSJ's India blog, Mint.

Oh well

So, blog fatigue. What's interesting is that the number of posts per month reflects best not the number of days I was in Bikaner but rather a relatively constant exponential decay. You might think I've found something more interesting to do-- but seeing as I know that something to be running around a track and partying in Delhi, I'm going to say I'm just not cut out to be a writer. But after receiving more feedback from not posting than I ever did, most recently from Caty in San Francisco (with a particular holler out to Laura), I figured the least I could do was mash my fingers on the keyboard and let you all know what's up. Other than a stellar visit from Noah and Shoy (email for details), though, there's not much to tell. I'm gearing up for a Fulbright conference in Calcutta, then returning to Bikaner for a few more weeks of research. What I will do is throw a few more posts up that have been waiting for an appropriately empty afternoon.

Reinventing reincarnation

Perhaps the most fascinating aspect of Hinduism is the idea of reincarnation. In this age of corporate yoga and pharmaceutical Buddhism there's hardly a person who can't expound on how we're all stuck in samsara, the eternal wheel of reincarnation, our souls endlessly striving towards final liberation or moksha. But other than philosophical fancy or fodder for stoned wonderment, what does reincarnation actually entail?

I found my high school adviser's metaphor to be quite helpful. We are all familiar with the sight of bubbles rising out of a carbonated drink. If we abandon for a moment our knowledge of chemistry, then it would seem that air emerges out of nothing, forms bubbles, and rises to the surface, dissolving into the atmosphere. In the same way, our souls (atman) are small pieces of the stuff of eternity (Brahman), like bubbles are of air. Our little 'divine sparks' are stuck in this world, like the air in the drink, but we also inevitably rise towards liberation. The bubble itself is the shell we create to shield ourselves from the nasty world- our egos.

That's all good and fine, but what does it mean for a strict materialist who doesn't want to concede all this 'eternity' and 'soul' jazz? I look at it this way. There's no need to invoke higher powers when you put your life up against the 6 billion others that are being lived right now (to say nothing of non-humans): the idea of that much humanity is eternal enough. The concession that your life is made up of the same stuff as anyone else's is tantamount to the idea that you could be born in any other life. The self-aggrandizing ego convinces us that we are 'lucky' to lead good lives, but really we're just monkeys with an attitude just like everyone else. And what goes around comes around.

Perhaps not the most elegant theory, but it gets across the same point. As Red Green would say: I'm pulling for you, cause remember, we're all in this together.

Breeds of Camel: Kacchi

The Kacchi camel hails from the swampy borderlands of southern Gujarat, where the Rann of Kacch forms a near-impassible barrier between modern Pakistan and India. The only large animal able to navigate these treacherous, misty bogs is the Kacchi camel, whose moderate size and wide feet, as well as reputed intelligence, grant it the ability to pick its way around trouble spots. The Kacchi is used by the Indian Border Defence Force to patrol in this area, but the Kacchi's main use is milk production. The sparsity of vegetation in the Rann led to the evolution of a longer lactational period and higher milk yield-- up to 20 liters a day!

Dippin' a toe in the orient

The most numerous (and harmless) type of tourist is the westerner who, finding themselves with some weeks or months to spare before the start of the next term or the expiration of unemployment benefits, decides to head to India to experience something a little exotic. It's a good choice: travel costs are low, the colorful culture is famously alluring, and, most importantly, Indians only kind of look like terrorists.

These tourists usually come to India with pretty high expectations for Indian culture-- parades of elephants/camels/palanquins, orange-clad holy men, colorful gods, etc.-- but thankfully tend not to have strong preconceptions. So they quickly fasten on the obvious, like cows in the streets and constant noise from temples, and are content to just see the sights and feel the vibe. They make excellent travel partners because they will treat every detail you point out as if it is the greatest insight ever made.

Their only major faults stem from their necessary naivety towards Indian culture. On the one hand, they remain oblivious to many of the more interesting (or distressing) aspects of Indian culture, for the most part never moving beyond the facade of poverty, religion, and cacophony. More annoyingly, they can joke for hours about the apparent irrationality of India, at once telling it just like it is and at the same time betraying the fundamental cultural arrogance that afflicts us all.

Saddle of camel: North Arabian model

By about 1000 B.C.E. the camel caravan was a common sight throughout the deserts of southwest Asia, regularly ferrying passengers and goods through the oven at the world's crossroads. But saddle designs adequate for carrying loads couldn't support a rider at full tilt. Until camels could be ridden well enough to be used in battle, the caravans were at the mercy of brigands on horseback operating from isolated oases deep in the desert. Between bribes to pass safely and the cost of an armed escort, camel herders were unable to reap the full benefits of the lucrative trade they carried and remained socially unimportant.

A new saddle design completely changed the course of Middle Eastern history. The North Arabian saddle, invented around 300-500 C.E., straddled the hump with a sturdy frame. Cargo could be loaded on and behind the hump and a rider could perch before it, his stability assured and within easy reach of the reins. Furthermore, seated atop the two-meter high withers of the camel, a rider could effectively wield a lance.

Camel herders quickly seized control of the caravan trade from the bandits and city merchants, and soon desert kingdoms emerged across much of Arabia. The most important of these was Mecca, which before 500 C.E. was little more than an oasis. Growing rich off the incense trade, by the time of Mohammed's birth in 570 C.E. it was a regional capital. With economic, military, and religious power in their hands, the camel herders of the Hedjaz were clearly in the ascendant.

Happy New Year

So I've been a little truant with updating. My parents came to visit for the holidays so I've had my hands full with playing tour guide. But now I'm settling in for a few more weeks of work at the NRCC.

I've also had the wind taken out of my sails in terms of academic pontifications-- it seems like everything I want to write about has been covered in greater depth and with much more fluency in Edward Luce's excellent In Spite of the Gods: The Rise of Modern India, which I've just finished reading on a freezing overnight train journey. I can't recommend this book enough for someone who wants to see beyond the spiritual and digital extremes that Western accounts of India so often adopt.