We have returned to Tirur today. Not exactly ‘Home Sweet Home’, but a home that is welcoming enough. To see familiar faces and be greeted with a smile and a question (“Where have you been?”) makes me feel settled.
I realized today that I missed the clean air and clear blue sky of Kerala. The muggy temperature, too, is a relief from the surprising bitterness of Delhi’s winter. (I walked around the city in flip-flops with temperatures sometimes in the low 40s.) I also realized that I had missed the simple pleasure of belonging. It struck me when we hailed an auto-rickshaw today outside the Tirur train station and saying, “Payannangadi” (our neighborhood) and having the driver nod affirmatively made me feel unexpectedly as if I was home.
On the other hand, I did not miss the slack-jawed stares the Kerala natives offer up to anyone who does not talk, look, or dress like them. Walking around Tirur’s market today was nearly as discomfiting as our first few days here back in October. Passers-by turn their heads blatantly and watch us as we walk down the street. They sidle up to us and simply look at us without engaging us in conversation. Out of the corner of my eye, I catch other people who stop whatever it is they are doing—shopping, drinking chai, talking to a friend, hailing a bus—so they can stare, as if we have stepped off the set of Star Trek: The Next Generation dressed as Klingons.
Delhi, the cosmopolitan capital of India that it is, had been a respite from this phenomenon. My parents, Jenna and I garnered no more attention then a pair of Chinese tourists or a gaggle of German pleasure-seekers or the half-naked sadhus or the lathi-toting Indian Army guards. We just simply blended in to the bustling background.
Tomorrow, we begin the second half of our commitment to JM Higher Secondary School. We have eight weeks left in our time here. In all honesty, the week off made us anxious to once again travel (which is what we plan to do in the months of March and April). It is not as if we are looking forward to our teaching being done, but we are certainly eager to get back on the road and experience more parts of India. Tirur has its charm, but you know the old axiom about the country girl who sees the bright lights of the big city.
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