Hi from the Village

A few posts ago, I announced that I was going to join EHA as a "Training Co-ordinator". Well, here I am. The Pastor found a place for me nd told me that it was only worth Rs 1000 a month, which, compared to other places, was extremely cheap! So, I said to my self "What-the-heck" without thinking that it would be in the heart of a weird urban North Indian village!Most aspiring youth in the movies leave small villages or towns to big cities to seek their luck. Some movies elaborate to tell about the life of this young kid who one day became... err.. I don't know... Ambani? Rockfeller? Recently, I left my home to seek my fortune. In Delhi... But there's a slight snag in the story. I'm a pure-blood city-slicker. Have been brought up in big cities all over the country, and now, am here to seek my fortune (or greater good, if you might call it) in a village in Delhi!
Hi there! Welcome to Ambihaigaun! The village in Dwarka! Look at the kind of waters the floating leaf is swimming through now! This village generally is full of lower-middle class folk with a very... err... North Indian village like demeanor. Unlike other 'normal' villages that are surrounded by fields, this village has walls to surround it. But don't be fooled! This is a genuine certified village complete with panchayat, community centre and all! The walls of DDA colonies. Inside these colonies live people of the upper-middle-class (Generally the kind of people I was raised with and can get to know easily). Since my home is outside those walls (which I shall talk about later), I do not identify with them. I usually look at them as snobs who have more than they need and don't know what to do with them (of course "amnesia"ing the house at Chennai I have left)
The people of the place are slowly getting to know me. The occasional shop-keeper who finds out where I am from, and what I am doing, to the stares I get from people as I walk past them. I considered (and still consider) those stares as rude, but to them, it's a way of getting to know someone. To show that they recognize you. I have been trying to act friendly and say Hi to everyone I see the second time, but all they do is stare at you. I remember ol Digg telling me of his feelings about saying Hi. According to him, it's a completely useless ritual and a waste of voice. Here too, he knows that you acknowledge his presence and he acknowledges you. Of course, in a village, you're supposed to notice and remember everybody's faces unlike the city, where you only recognize a select faces you see very often, and in order to show you recognize them, you wave out so they notice you. But in the village, all this is taken for granted! Gee, I am learning a lot! (Not a bad observation for a hobbying anthropologist who's been here three days, eh?)
Almost (I said almost) everything you need to run a house can be found in the two rows of shops quite close to home. (Sometimes I wonder if one row of shops is a bad photocopy of the other) There is an ATM (for Axis bank, which I might make an account in, let's see) and a milk shop that roughly divides the two rows. And for things you cannot get (at least at a decent price) here, you'll have to make a trip to the big city, it takes about an hour to get there (of course, not in a cramped Government bus but in the AC of the metro (which is still cramped by the way) and get the choicest goods for the choicest prices (of course, if you know where to look)
I haven't completely explored either Ambihaigaun or even Dwarka for that matter. Ambihaigaun just doesn't so exciting to explore, and Dwarka is too big to be explored on foot. However, I now know how to go where I want to go! May be, as I get to know the place better, I might start posting!