first days in india!

namaskara!

i am officially in hubli, where i'll be spending the majority of my time for the program. we flew to germany and then mumbai (it was a long 17 hoursssss). our first day in mumbai was a whirlwind! we got up in the morning and took a bus tour around the city. we saw the huge dohbi washing area. Dohbi are the caste that does clothes washing. its huge! they do laundry for everyone in that area of town, which is crazy. and apparently its extremely accurate. our tour guide had never, ever lost any of her laundry by using the dobhi service.

we also went to the gateway to mumbai and elephanta island, where there are stone carvings in a cave from 200 bc. they were REALLY cool. it was a long ferry ride out there though, on a boat that looked like this voyage might be the last.

we also saw gandhi's house and his famous spinning wheel. we're all pretty jetlagged and a little loopy. this morning we got up and flew to hubli. hubli is BEAUTIFUL! i definitely like hubli alot more than mumbai. it's exactly what i thought india would be like. we all piled into a bus, and since the bus couldn't fit all our luggage, they just piled it on the roof, but dont worry a guy sat up there to make sure it wouldn't fall off. we got to our guesthouse that we'll be staying in for the next 6 weeks and its great. we have a kitchen and a living room and a tv and the bedrooms are pretty nice. AND WIFI! woooo internet. we went over to the desphande center for social entrepreneurship and met the indian students we'll be working with. they were really nice and excited to meet us. we did our traditional indian dance we learned a few weeks ago and they were all laughing and taking pictures. its definitely going to be a fun 6 weeks! :)




much love!
danielle

Anticipation...

Tomorrow.
I can't believe it's tomorrow.

22 students from NU (half from business and half from arts sciences) will be working with 20-25 TSiBA (Tertiary School of Business Admin) students. TSiBA is a business school (no kidding) in Pinelands, a suburb of sorts outside of Cape Town. The students who attend TSiBA live in the townships in the Cape Town area (Cape Flats, Nyanga, Khayelitsha, Mfuleni). Townships were created during the time of apartheid, as a result of the government designating town/city areas as "white only". This forced the black and coloured to the periphery of the town/city. Some townships can be centers for violence, crime and poverty. At the same time, great movements and people have risen out of townships--Nelson Mandela, Desmond TuTu, the ANC and the Anti-Apartheid movement. Either way you look at township life, the students of TSiBA are going to have some amazing stories and be great teachers.

So, two NU students and two TSiBA students will be working together in business teams to consult a township entrepereneur on how to expand/improve their business--which helps more people to find jobs and provide for their families. Hopefully, enacting a ripple effect that improves the local economy and allows people to provide for the basic needs of their families. It's going to be tough--especially as I am not a business student, but I have love, enthusiasm and excitement that I hope will make up for my lack of business knowledge.

We'll be in Cape Town/Pinelands for one month, attending business and south african history/econ classes in the morning and consulting in the townships in the afternoon. We'll also be going on some pretty amazing excursions together--Cape Point, Robben Island, Table Mountain, a safari and much more. (shark diving anyone?)

Then, 3 other lovely ladies and I are exploring a tiny morsel of the beautiful continent of Africa. We'll be going to Johannesburg and Durban before taking off for Zambia (Victoria Falls! Bungee jumping!) and Tanzania (the lovely paradise island of Zanzibar).

It's going to be the experience of a lifetime. I can't wait!