Suwanee Teacher Heads for India

Note: This first-person account originally was published in Buckhead Patch.

My husband and I are going to India, the land of saris, curry, Buddha, rickshaws, head-bobbles, cricket and Hanuman the monkey god.

Three months ago, I could not have named half of those characteristics of ancient Mother India. Our goal last fall was simple: to earn the Fulbright Teacher Exchange grant and move to Europe for a year. Dean would teach physics to young Scottish lads, and I would learn to knit sweaters, drink Scotch and appreciate a cloudy day.

In April, a congratulatory letter announced that Dean (Landers) had been accepted into the Fulbright Teacher Exchange program. His location assignment, however, would come in a later email. India was waiting for us like a decorated elephant sitting in our living room.

Dean and I both grasp at any chance to travel. Between the two of us we have visited Europe, South and Central America, Jamaica, Israel, and the British Virgin Islands. East, it seemed, was the only direction we had left to go. Co-workers, family and friends all told us it would be a fantastic adventure. “Everything that goes wrong will just make for great stories when you get back,” one friend said.

We accepted the mission: teaching at the Welham Girls School in Dehradun, a city in the northern state of Uttarakhand, India. Meanwhile, Ms. Anju Gupta of Dehradun decided to come teach at Peachtree Ridge High School in Suwanee, her first time outside India. The two physics teachers will switch classrooms for one semester, August to December 2011.

Gupta will discover hamburgers in the school cafeteria and "Star Wars" examples in physics textbooks. Dean will encounter students who do three hours of homework each day and seventh graders learning calculus. I will sit in on yoga and cooking classes at Welham, and join the school trips trekking in the Himalayas and rafting on the upper Ganges River. I will also be pleased to join in on the school's British customs: fruit break each morning at 10, and afternoon tea daily at 2.

The Welham Girls School community has welcomed us already. Knowing we Americans were unused to the “simple lifestyle” led by the teachers and students who board on campus, the principal set us up to live in a nearby apartment with air conditioning. She described the apartment as “within pole-vaulting distance” of the campus.

Ice cubes in beverages will be off-limits to us in India, where we should drink only if we “heard the seal break on the bottle.” If we choose to drink the water, we are sure to get what is known as “Delhi-belly.”

Greetings, gift-giving and tea-visits will be moments of uncertainty. For example, in India, when receiving a gift, one does not say thank you, because it is the expected duty (“dharma”) of the giver. My natural graces will be put to the test, because in India, a host can expect dinner guests to arrive anywhere from two to three hours late ... or the next day. Not even bathing will bring familiar comfort, since my bathtub will be replaced by a knee-level spigot and a bucket. 

For a freelance journalist, there is no better place to visit than the utterly foreign Eastern world of India. I look forward to expanding the vocabulary of my five senses as I intake the bright fabrics, fresh spices and traffic controlled by cows.

As a teacher, Dean will expand his teaching methods to cater to the learning style of Indian students in a British-founded school. The engrained Indian style of learning by memorization will challenge the young American’s style of teaching physics, which often includes a Slinky, a bouncy ball, two magnets, straws and duct tape.

The hope of the Fulbright program is to bring cross-cultural unity and mutual understanding between the schools. Fulbright has told us seriously that we are going as ambassadors from the United States, representing our country’s social and educational culture. (I hope we carry the banner respectably!) Dean and I will also represent our closer community of Atlanta: I am packing Braves baseball caps and jars of peach preserves for gifts.

Goals for the trip: call the bank (sign up with a new bank that has the lowest international transaction fee), check on international health care coverage, make annual physical and dentist appointments, update passport to married name, buy plane tickets without maxing out the credit card, make arrangements for the condo bills while we’re gone, get vaccinations and prescription vacation overrides and apply for visas.

I caution all Indian visa applicants to reserve months for this process. I was asked to resubmit my application four times, sometimes for opposing “reasons.” I came to know by name the customer-service phone attendants at the consulate in Houston. (Of all the foreign consulates in Buckhead, why not India?) Finally my visa and passport were returned to me. I was thrilled to fill out the customer satisfaction survey for Travisa Outsourcing.

I’ve come to believe the logistics of planning a long-term stay abroad are unending, and the only force that finally leads the traveler to announce “I’ve done it! I am ready,” is the plane that sweeps her off the runway.

Ready or not, Monday morning, Aug. 1, we will be on our way, with open hearts and minds to embrace the people and customs of India. I plan to write again to Patch from Dehradun, and provide consistent updates of our travels on our blog: landersinindia.blogspot.com. First stop: New Delhi and the Taj Mahal.