The Usual Unusual

Nov. 23

I find myself in an unusual situation. I don’t feel as though I have much to write about! ‘How can that be?’ I hear someone question. ‘You’ve been in India for three months!’ While that statement accurately describes my current circumstance, it does not capture the true reality of the experience for me. For the first time in my fifteen years of traveling to India, I have recently suddenly ‘realized’ I am in India as I walk from home to work or back again. Yes, motorcycles and trucks are beeping loudly around me. Yes, I am aware of the occasional stares I get for being the rare foreigner in this area. And yes, I am constantly surrounded by languages I do not understand. But what was once unusual and full of constant discoveries about life, culture and people has, relatively unexpectedly, become usual.

My blogs are full of sights, sounds and smells that have regularly captured my attention over the years and varied experiences. As I look back on my many visits this country, I vividly recall trying hard to adjust to life here, its rhythms and norms. I just as vividly recall frustrations as I encountered experiences here that didn’t fit my previous life experiences and how those made me feel a little isolated and disconnected. Don’t get me wrong. I enjoyed those frustrations as well, but always felt a little apart from life here in India.

Walking down one of the alleyways near my current home recently, to my surprise, I thought ‘I’m in India.’ I had been thinking of the coming day’s rehearsal, when I next needed to get to the store, if I wanted to stop by the local fast food joint to get a break from my rice-focused lunches and what book I would order on Amazon. Except for the lunches part, those others are my ‘norm’ otherwise.

And then I thought how well I know Kolkata and Delhi airports. How to anticipate what crowds will be like at the airport. When best to cross the street. Which shops I might visit at what times to get what I need. What vehicle is behind me by the sound of the beep.

I’ve written of the comfort of being in other countries, due to the frequency of visiting such places, but I don’t recall a time I surprised myself with the suddenness of feeling ‘usual.’ I do get those stares regularly. I lack understanding of all of the local languages. I am awkward with local transportation. But those ‘unusuals’ are so much my ‘usual,’ that I do not notice them in the same way as I did in my early years here.

And now my friends know other friends of mine in various parts of the country. A current student of mine was once the student of an artist I worked with many years ago down south. Another current student attended a college that an American friend of mine taught at. This experience has become as usual as any usual I live anywhere.

Of course, then I go to get a haircut and the barber wants to take a selfie with me, so…