WARNING: Get ready for a long post … it’s been a while since I had the time and brain power to put this together.

Today we’ve arrived in Mumbai, formerly known as Bombay, which is the largest and most modern city in India. Already I have seen the Gateway to India which is the port from which the last of the British Army left India for good. We also met some amazing teachers, principals, and future teachers at a College this afternoon who wow-ed us with artistic performances like the ones they hope teachers will be doing with their students in the future. It was a nice change of pace from the lecture only approach we have seen and heard a lot about so far. This city will be an impressive one, I can already tell.

But I don’t want to forget the key things I’ve seen and thought about since my last post. Today one of the pieces was a student-written and performed “ballet” about HIV/AIDS education. It reminded me of the work the Zinn and Livaccari Advisories do for World AIDS Day. The dance showed a snippet about how one can contract AIDS, though it was only visibly through physical contact, which made me nervous that they might spread this misinformation about how it is spread. But the conclusion was inspiring … they choose a song from a popular Hindi movie about not giving up, living your life to its fullest, and joining hands to help make a change in the world. It impressed me to see this final product, to think about the groupwork that I know went into the performance, and the forward-thinking of the teachers who orchestrated it since sex and sexuality are not openly discussed in Indian culture. But the recognition that not discussing it won’t make it go away was obvious, and refreshing.

Yesterday we saw a Synagogue in Kochi in a small neighborhood where the Jewish community once thrived. Now there are four families, 14 people remaining. It was a holiday (which many of you already know), so there wasn’t much activity, but I did meet Sarah Cohen, and embroidery expert with a small shop. She was a dear old woman with a huge smile and great pride in her Jewish heritage. The Synagogue was beautiful, though I only saw it from the outside and through postcard images, and my favorite part is the clock tower which shows one side in Hebrew, on in Roman Numerals, and one in Malayalam (the local language). It shows how welcoming the community was (and is) of diversity and how the people of India recognize the importance of embracing different cultures rather than ostracizing them. It was a touching visit.

I also want to talk just for a moment about Vedic Mathematics, which we learned about at a school visit in Kochi. The Vedas are the ancient religious books of the Hindu Religion, and the records show specific processes used in those ancient times for completing various computations. There is also evidence of equations, problems, and patterns being discovered and worked on in India well before they were “discovered” by European mathematicians, which is something we’ll study in History of Math units more carefully in the future. We learned the pattern for completing a multiplication problem the other day, and finished in just a few moments. The process is much easier and faster than our conventional methods and made me think … why is it that we are so often working to make things MORE difficult as we advance through time, rather than LESS?

Finally, I must tell you about the martial artists we saw last evening, Kalaripayattu. This once secret art form has become more popular since the Independence, but is a dangerous way to pass the time. The artists wield heavy mallets, swords, metallic shields, and daggers as they jump over one another, duck beneath jabs, and entertain the crowd. One young man was actually bleeding after his demonstration and spent the rest of the evening showing us his blood-stained outfit. Many of you won’t be surprised to know that I flinched a few times and hid behind my neighbor during the “long sword” swinging, but overall I was impressed with the discipline and strength of the talented men (women used to perform as well, but it has become very uncommon), and it was nice to see one of the most ancient martial art forms.