Djinns in Delhi, Gaiety in Goa

I find myself on a Southern Goan beach guiltily glutting on soft dark green avacados: the most un-Indian of edibles. They cannot be baked in a tandoor; deep fried in a batter of gram flour and cumin seeds; mixed with curry leaves and stuffed in a crispy dosa; or scooped up with an acidic, seedy, lime pickle. And yet they are here, along with every other possible wish or whim, in the shacks of sleepy, lovely, Benaulim where I am spending Christmas and new year with the others of my clan, celebrated vividly by the abundance of Goan Christians (the Portuguese were a touch better at imprinting Christianity on their colonial subjects than the British ever managed to be).

First things first, I have many stories to tell which I will have to suffuse to a fine potion of startlingly wonderful temples, monuments, and mausoleums, built by Chandelas, Bundelas, Mughals, Rajputs, etc etc etc.


I won't be a bore and relate it all, as fascinating as it was. Just know that the palace forts of Orchha are looming and graceful, the temple carvings of Kajuraho alarmingly rude and intricate, and the perfection of the Taj Mahal still manages to make up for the rest of Agra - a place which suffers from a vacuum of the soul, where tourism has rotten it to the core, where the atmosphere is distinctly 'us and them' (ok, I got rocks thrown and me by teenagers so I'm biased). Still, I met up with a bit of a travel writer on India and his words could have been my own: it's a shithole.


With boundless optimism we rode onwards and upwards to Delhi, the pair of us radiant with excitement about the capital city that we had read so much about. Delhi holds the secret of at least six fallen cities and has been the seat of empire time and time again. We strode happily down the European boulevards of New Delhi, cowering under the austere and visionary British architecture, poking around the ruins of Tughlaqabad and Siri in the south and then, before I knew it, we were struck down with an illness so grim we were bedridden for a week. Lamentably, I missed most of Delhi, and all of Jaipur, as I rolled around in a stupor in grotty hotel rooms. Anyway, here's a Jaipur sunset for the hell of it.


Just before Goa, we spent a few days in dorms in Mumbai: a fabulous, cosmopolitan, buzzing city which I will remember for its higgledy-piggledy colonial architecture, parks packed with cricket matches, bhel puri on Chowpatty Beach, the beautiful view of the city from the rock cut caves of Elephanta Island, and the sight of the Gateway to India as you sail away from the Mumbai coast, just as the British did for the very last time in 1947.

Varanasi: Purgatory, Puja, Pastry

Filled with wintry abandon, we are sliding up the sliced open heart of India, running - mostly sensibly - amok.After contemplation and caffeine headaches at Gandhi's ashram, we watched the landscape change from verdant cultivating fields to flat, wiry scrubland as we swerved northeast to Varanasi in a 20 hour train journey in third AC - a profane luxury after becoming so accustomed to the exuberant chaos and part-time cockroaches of sleeper class.
It comes as no surprise to a visitor of Varanasi - and there are many at this time of year - to learn that it is the central focus of the Hindu religion and one of the oldest cities in the world. Our magnificently cheap lodge towered high up in the Old City, a labyrinth of narrow alleyways, flanked by rather persistent sellers of garments, jewellery, sweets and chai, which barely accommodates the surge of pilgrims and tourists that pulse though it. I have never been so repeatedly lost and so surprised by the places my inexperienced tread led me. Many times we followed a simple route parallel to the river and found ourselves bewildered outside of a temple, stuck in the pushy throng of men and women from all over India eager to offer puja to the resident god; or scratching out heads after ending up in a cul-de-sac with no one but a masticating cow trying to get a bit of chill-out time from the madness outside; or, uncomfortably, in the rubbish and sewage-strewn court yard of the slum-like local residence, where barely-clad children played kites and tickled puppies among the waste.

Once we had ploughed our way through the maze, retracing our steps from doorways and stairs that led nowhere and throwing off the touts and hawkers, we found ourselves at the ghats. These high steps fringe the Ganges on one side, accompanied by temples, lingams, observatories and a host of of wonderfully ornate buildings dating from a range of periods of history, all of which exist in varying degrees of splendour and decrepitude.We often spent whole days wandering along the ghats, watching the Ganges with its bathers and pilgrims enjoying the (frankly toxic) river water as dobhis lay out saris on the riverbank, patchworked with drying fabrics.


On two nights we paid rowers to take us out on leaky wooden boats. From the moonlit river we half curiously, half reluctantly, saw the fires from burning corpses illuminate the temples along the river in scene of apocalyptic proportions - although it was perversely tempered by the droves of tour groups in engine boats whose bumbags were silhouetted against the flames. It was forbidden, and deemed highly unrespectful, to take photographs, although it did not stop the bumbag wallahs who perched on tiptoes, presumably arching for the best shot for their cadaver collections 2010.

Gandhi's Ashram: Satyagraha and Secret Naps

Khaki pants a-go-go, the sightseeing has commenced. We left Vijayawada station, emotions tempered with a wonderfully fitting send off in the form of a six hour delay.

Then a few days in Hyderabad to see Golconda Fort (below) - a citadel which was the area's capital before Hyderabad, and which has seen all sorts of fascinating rulers, from Qutb Shahs to the Nizams who stepped in after Aurangzeb's Mughal invasion. It's worth venturing out to Hyderabad for this alone.

We left Hyderabad for Sevagram on a packed train, without a seat. After eight hours of sneaking on someone else's berth, we pulled in to a disconcertingly clean, quiet village in the heart of India, looking for a place to stay in the Ashram.

A small kerfuffle over there being no where for us to stay, then they found us a room on site and let us settle in. But first we had to go with the ashramites who were sorting us out to a family's house across the street. 'What for?' we asked. 'Marriage, marriage...' they replied.

We looked on blankly and then a roar of laughter and no further explanation. Naughty, sneaky Gandhians. Thankfully it transpired that we were just going to a celebrate the marriage of Lord Krishna by standing outside a house and throw

ing bits of rice on a small tree while they sang chants. An unexpected way of spending the evening but that's life. Anyway, they gave us tasty snacks of puffed rice and pulses which were like manna after a day of nothing more than oat biscuits.

After crashing to bed at 9pm, we woke to bells at 4.30am and joined the handful of others, sitting in the dark, on the veranda of Gandhi's house for prayer and meditation whilst a man and a woman chanted. The rest of the day was structured around small tasks - I swept Gandhi's house and Wilf picked leaves from his lawn, and we both helped to weed the vegetable garden (the ashram is entirely self-sufficient) - plus very basic communal meals and reflection (which I called nap time, although this wasn't really allowed).

Escape from the Deccan

My time in Andhra Pradesh has come to an end. We spent the last few days zooming around on buses to Avanigadda and Visanapeta, finishing off work and sitting in on awareness programmes and meetings for the next public hearings. We were treated with a few visits to PSVS hostels for school dropouts: heads, shoulders, knees, toes and other variants of fun. It's strange to think of it all continuing, work which is so important for so many, yet so exasperatingly fragile.

Here is a picture of the gang of volunteers, workers, helpers and general superwomen from the Avanigadda compound. I will miss their warmth, their solidarity, their cackles of laughter at any given opportunity.



And another photo for good measure; there are million thing that I haven't had a chance to comement on in this blog, and the MJM College walk is one of them. In solidarity with a donor who is walking thousands of miles around Holland to raise money for the college, the students at MJM walked 20km a day for five days. Quite a feat in that temperature. The photo shows Wilf and Bhaskar - who works for PSVS and the college - taking a rest after a particularly sweaty day of the walk. Bhaskar really is a king among men, adored by the students and indispensable for the NGO. He is also famed for his excellent taste in fried snacks and sweets - his gifts to us were abundant!



I shall miss the Krishna District and all its charms: the arching palmyras, the lush, wet, paddies, the bedazzling heights of Vijayawada, the monkeys hanging out in Tiruvur, the activists and NGO heros who are too many to list and are left to do too much, Theresa with her infinite maternal kindness whose heart is that of a true warrior for social justice, and last but not least, the wails of the pigs outside of our small and lovely flat in Gannavaram.

The Avanigadda Public Hearing

Take this as a scene: the cook and housemaid at the PSVS compound - the gorgeously exuberant, wide-eyed lady who tutors me in chappati, dahl, and dosa, and breaks up the long days with 'coffee Joey' - is stood on a brightly-lit stage, in front of 500 people, in floods of furious tears.

Despite the Telugu, I knew the outline of the story she was relating to the audience of the Town Hall; it had been recorded weeks before this day, translated, and given to me and Wilf to prepare for publication. The story relates her own experience of unthinkable loss, abuse, confinement and violence, at the hands of previous husbands. She is one of 25 women who gave their testimonies on the 29th of October at the Krishna District Court of Women's first public hearing in Avanigadda.


After days of laborious, repetitive work and frazzled nerves, with the last folders folded, and all documentation a-ready, the court finally commenced. The expert witnesses, consisting of academics and delegates from women's rights NGOs whose function was to 'make sense of' and 'contextualise' the violence, took their places on the stage. The audience of testifiers, other NGO and women's group members, volunteers, politicians, students, lawyers, locals, and other interested folk, watched on.

Thus the day unfolded, predictably chaotic, mostly incomprehensible to my English ears but, thankfully, a success. The testimonies were given despite power cuts and an audience whose levels of respect wavered throughout. And with all the tears and the hitches, each of the women who spoke did so with dignity, purpose and confidence, finally giving a voice to the violence which has become endemic behind the closed doors of homes in Andhra Pradesh.

'There's nothing like this in the district - or even in any district here' said Jose, a campaigner and staff member who has dedicated his life to promoting rights and education to the vulnerable, particularly the tribal communities of India.

As far as I'm concerned, this says it all. In a country that is bursting at the seams with NGOs, which holds perfectly decent women's rights legislation, there are still no forums where women can simply stand up and express the crimes committed against them. There are so many reasons for this, from cultural and social biases to insane levels of corruption, which prevent the mainstream courts, police, and political and welfare institutions from providing a fair platform for women.

What a triumph that, for one day, the court of women provided such a space.

Picture book diary

All I ever seem to do is write. Posters, brochures, manifestos on women's human rights, all of them so flowery they leave you bouquet-heady with the delights of Indian idioms.

Here are some pictures to speak some words:


The view from the Charminar in Hyderabad - the busiest city I have ever set my sandal in. A truly wonderful, disorientating place.


Finishing my book on the train back to Vijayawada. We stood in the open doorway for the last hour as the train pulled in, racing across the vast moonlit river from Gunter district.


Only hanging out in a private members club with some friends - yes, I said friends. So what if they're just the guys that fix my laptop?


The beach at Machilipatnam - less swimming, more speeding in a motorbike/autorickaw with your entire extended family on board. Still, I dipped in the sea and swam in all of my clothes, appearing, as far as the reaction of other beach-goers tells me, like a ginger sea monster.

Work and more work

As the first Court of Women public hearing looms ever closer, the work load weighs heavier. The public hearing will take place Avanigadda at the end of October. Women from this part of the district who have survived extreme violence at the hands of family members will offer their testimonies to the court, trying to lift the shroud of silence on the issue and, maybe, gain some redress, who knows. Expert witnesses will give speeches, trying to make sense of the violence from a variety of perspectives: political, social, legal, medical, and so on.

I spent last week working almost day and night far away from home in Avanigadda, with poor Wilf stranded back in Gannavaram. The work ethic in the PSVS compound was terrific: up at 6am, on to work until a thick mist of sleep clouds your eyes with lots of snacks and coffees punctuating the day. For me it meant 10/11pm, for others it meant the early hours of the morning. I was fund raising anxiously, a desperate bid to cover a budget that is inflating by the hour.

Our week ended (on Saturday of course, never Friday) at All India Radio with Theresa giving an impassioned speech on women's rights (or she could have been talking about her penchant for kittens for all I know, the Telugu gap widens by the day). Then on to a Global Forum for Women event in a very grand hall with chandeliers hanging spledidly and inappropriately, whilst the committee - all male of course - championed the cause of women's human rights (or talked about kittens?). Apparently these guys are supposed to 'sensitise' the government to 'women's issues'; the reality, it seems, is that they take funding from other NGOs and enjoy a lot of expensive, elaborate events. Bah.

This week my work-base was closer to home, just a bus hop (an Indian hop, not an English one), to Vijayawada, in a complex of NGOs dedicated to enforcing child rights. Everyone is madly gathering the testimonies, throwing them recklessly around in a ping pong of Telugu and English, with edits and re-edits forming tangled knots all over the shop.

Wilf's off from school for a week - I'm setting down the laptop and heading to Amaravathi to be a tourist again.

Ganesh Chaturthi

Festival ‘season’ is upon us, a stint which lasts until January of next year. Last weekend we went to Vijayawada – the streets, splurging already with humanbeingshumanbeings, had gone wild in praise of the elephant god as Ganesh was paraded around on Rickshaws or displayed for worship in monochrome tents which glowed crassly with too many fairy lights.

(Vijayawada at night)

We left Vijayawada for Bhavani Island, a quick boat ride across into a ringfenced oasis of peace where the nutural beauty is, quite literally, policed. The floor is a thick green carpet, the high trees, the bushes, the flowers and NO TRAFFIC oh has there ever been such quiet before anywhere? But stick to the path and don’t drop litter or the police man will spit a shrill whistle in your ear.

Walking around the island, we entered a clearing where fully grown adults, including women in flowing saris, played on giant playground apparatus. Spiderwebs, rope bridges, swings and the like.

We wept with laughter. This, we concluded, was what the middle classes get up to in Vijayawada, when they’re not looking at caged monkeys and giant plastic dinosaurs in the Rajiv Gandhi gardens (a story for another time). We pondered it with a mango juice, looking out over the Krishna, over the mountains, and the hallucinating city alive with festivity.

The Courts of Women

Our first day at MJM college, set up by PSVS for school dropouts – ex-child labourers and the like. Not, shall we say, an underwhelming welcome. Posters, banners, intricate chalk drawings on EVERY blackboard, beaming off the floor and steps. ‘Welcome Zoe and Wilf’ adorns each nook, each cranny, until I’m sweating with expectant eyes.

‘I’m not supposed to be teaching – I’m working for PSVS, WIlf is teaching.’ They don’t quite understand me. Still, I have helped just a touch in the classroom and they are starting to get used to me sat typing in Principal Rau’s office.

So far my work has been on the Vijayawada Court of Women which is happening in one month. Courts of Women were started 20 years ago by the Asian Women’s Human Right’s Council on all sorts of topics: war, HIV, sex trafficking, globalization. They offer a space for women who have suffered violence and discrimination to give testimonies, to be listened to, in front of an audience, expert witnesses and a jury. The idea is to allow suffering to be voiced and addressed, in places where cultures, authorities, and justice systems tend to silence women.

I have been editing victims’ testimonies which read like catalogues of extraordinary violence. The dowry is the root of so much of it; women are locked into a system which treats them as commodities, where husbands are free to be as abusive as they please in the knowledge that society will support the man and never the woman. They can beat their wives, abuse them, rape them, set them alight, force abortions, and most of the time the police will condone it, no prosecution will follow because of prejudice or bribery. Wives don’t leave because losing honour is a worse fate than death.

There is so much preparation going in to the court. Last week the survivors participated in playback theatre, relating their experiences to a group of actors who then played it back to the audience. An odd idea, and perhaps the scenes in question are too sensitive to leave in the hands of drama? We have also been making power points showing videos of previous courts to present to girls schools and women's groups. More to come.

First hop over the vada

We have done Cochin, the Indian-Chinese-Portuguese hotchpotch with winding streets, all dosa and banana. Fishing nets, Jew Town spice market, Dutch Palace, Ernakulum ferry and mad techno hubbub – done. Rahool from the fort (‘don’t feel sorry for the Mumbai slummers they all have cable’) and Mr Benson who ran the home stay, who sang Hindi movie songs with his friends and the other English traveller (Foo Fighters: the Bollywood years), and old Ignatius Benson who took to kissing Wilf’s stomach – farewell.

Two weeks have passed since the 18 hour chug to Vijayawada, sweaty on the sleeper. She took us to buy pots and pans and sped us maniacally through the Krishna District.

First stop was our flat in Gannavaram: three rooms, ants and lizards galore, no shower, but a ceiling fan which can soothe all calamities. Home sweet home.

Next stop, the PSVS compound in Atkur, two hours away (Theresa’s home). This place is all chipmunks and fruit trees, frilling the house, the offices, the outside meeting space which sits like a band stand ready for performance. Durga cooks and we chat with Theresa, and other activists who stop by, about dowry, female degradation, child marriage, child labour, domestic violence, police corruption and on it blows; the struggle is her life blood. She laughs, however, at any opportunity, particularly where translation is concerned: 'Have you ever seen a man-go up a coconut tree?', and so on.

Then two days in Visanapeta, compound number two, the HQ three hours away. Smiling Lakshmi feeding us as we hide from the monsoon and Theresa leaves to hunt down a child who is being forced into marriage that night. Mission accomplished, she is found and sent to school.