Week of Rest

the project jeep dropped me off on the road in front of my apartment on saturday afternoon after a long last week in the scary house. when it pulled away, i was standing there with 2 roll-up beds, my computer, and about 8 bags with equipment, pots and pans, and clothes. i was preparing myself to make lug it all of that up the stairs to my apartment when all the neighborhood kids came out and grabbed bags and carried it up with me. at the top of stairs, my next door neighbor was waiting with open arms to help too. it was really very touching and welcoming. what a relief to be back in ponnampet for the week! here are 2 pictures of the little town in ponnampet. it has a margin free (grocery store), chemist (drug store), bakery, bank, etc. the next town over, gonnikoppal, is larger and about 15 minutes away by rick shaw which costs 60 rupees or about $1.50. the bus is 5 rupees, but i usually treat myself to a rick shaw.


the next picture is of the little girl that lives next to me. she is 2 years old and very sweet. she comes into my apt every now and then, but is pretty shy. her mom draws on her eyebrows every day. i asked my field assistant about this. she said that it is to make the eyebrows grow in thick. her mom didn’t do that for her, that’s why her eyebrows are too thin.


nothing too exciting to report on the research front this past week. i mainly entered my data – which takes hours – and tried to catch up with my emails (and sleep). i also spent a couple of days at the forestry college to check the traps, get equipment ready, and speak to the team and their boss about logistics for the coming weeks. i cut my finger on one of the traps – which is becoming a weekly event. they had no bandaids at the college, so the lady that was cleaning the floors wrapped my bloody finger in a rag/skirt that she had around her waist. it was really very sweet, but also very dirty. i cleaned it thoroughly when i got back to my apartment and it is fine.

sometimes trying to get anything done at the college is like entering in a time warp – you can be there for hours and get nothing done. all the doors to the rooms are locked with pad locks and there seems to be only one key, finding out who has the key and if you have permission to use it alone can take half a day. then the boss’s office is like a bus station. two assistants sit in the office and there is always a queue of students, faculty, and visitors waiting to talk to the boss (or “sir” as they call him). even when you are talking with him, there are people coming in all the time, so it is difficult to have his undivided attention and get anything accomplished. he has a bell on his desk that he rings and people come running at the sound. one evening when i was leaving the college, “sir” was walking to his car with my 2 female research assistants in tow, one carrying his lap top for him and the other his lunch while his arms were empty. it is very much like a paternal relationship that he has with his student and the project team. he will ask me, “how are my boys and girls?” even though all of them are in their mid to late 20s. it is quite interesting. (picture is of a temple with the om symbol which is the sign of god and his three pronged fork - i thougt at first it was the devil's pitch fork)

most of the other people in my field team went to their “native” or their home town during this week off. they are used to taking 6-7 hour night buses on sunday night and then coming into work on monday morning. i don’t know how they do it. the mother of the woman who married out of her caste prepared a special pooja which means worship or prayer for her. she believes that one of the bad gods has been with her for the past couple of years causing her hardships in her life. the pooja involves serving 25 children a meal and then hopefully the god will leave her. these 2 little girls in the picture were walking by one day when we working on the site and i took their picture. the kids like to see their pictures in the digital camera after you take it.


my roommate was gone all this week for field work. she came back only on saturday afternoon, then left again on sunday evening. it was good to see her for a bit though. we had a bbq with some of the european researchers on saturday night. it was really nice. we made homemade veggie burgers, potatoes and onions, and vegetable kabobs on the grill. four of the other researchers have left in the past 2 weeks and my roommate leaves in 3 weeks…that will just leave the 2 french researchers, one who is studying carbon sequestration in the coffee farms and one who is studying the hydrology, and me (who is studying mammals :)

Bait sandwiches

i’m not going to lie, the last week in the murnad house was quite challenging. i am starting to find the edge of patience and tolerance. monday started with us arriving early to the sites to set up the grids and traps. i was on a team with 4 other guys who either didn’t notice or didn’t tell me that my pants ripped in the butt…nice. then that night, there was big fight in which 2 of the field team members screamed in my face. then one of my sandals was mysteriously missing the next morning (a dog got it i am told - which could be true) meaning that the only shoes i had for the week were my hiking boots – but actually it didn’t matter because i didn’t go anywhere at night. so for the rest of the week, 2 of the people were not speaking to one person making the work and house a tense environment. sometimes i feel like i am a camp counselor for a middle school summer camp. it is quite exhausting after working in the field all day. one more month of field work before my advisor and 5 undergrad students join me here. i am hoping that it will be a relief to have them here, but it could just add to the drama – we shall see…

the camera traps are continuing to yield results which is great. i think we got a picture of a jackal – i am working with the mammal specialist here to get a positive id on it. this siting is particularly exciting as jackals are starting beginning to decline rapidly in this area due to habitat loss. we are still getting extremely low trap rates with the small rodents, but are also getting good results with the track plates that basically take the foot prints of the animals as they go into a box to get bait and then come back out.

i am still scared of riding in the jeep, particularly with the driver that is an older man. he really personifies the phrase “bat out of hell” with his driving and i have learned that he has problems with his eyes – great. we usually have 7 people in the jeep – the driver, the 2 women in the front seat, then me and 3 or 4 guys in the back. i feel like being squished in the back seat is safer, but still you hold on for dear life. the young men here are very affectionate with each other – sitting on each other’s laps, holding hands, putting their arms around each other. it just means that they are friends and there isn’t any flirtation involved really which is strange, they are just sitting in the back seat of the jeep holding hands. men and women are not allowed to date or really have much physical contact with each other at all until they are married, so this type of affection does not happen between the men and women at all. it happens a little between the women as well, but very little compared to the guys it seems.

i made a mexican dinner for everyone on thursday night which went over well. we had warm, crappy beer to go with it (or the guys and i did) – the first sip suddenly brought me back to my high school days, umm warm beer :) the meal turned out well, other than the fact that i got rice flour instead of wheat flour for the tortillas – so the women jumped in and made chapatti that we used as tortillas – so it was a mexican/indian dinner actually. the driver does not speak much english, but loved the food. he said “thank you for mexico food. please make it every day, i will help.” it was very cute.

it is difficult for me to figure out what to eat with only a gas burner – no refrigerator or oven. most of the things that i eat require refrigeration, i think. i eat peanut butter and honey sandwiches sometimes. they don’t know peanut butter here other than that i make it for the bait. one day when i was making my sandwich, asha said – eww, that smells just like the bait. i said told her it basically was. so now they think i eat bait sandwiches. i got eggs one day – which i knew from costa rica that if you get them fresh, they do not need refrigeration. i learned last week, that to tell if they are still good – you shake them and if it makes a noise, it has gone bad. i am reading this great book by barbara kingsolver called animal, vegetable, miracle. i have read of all her books which i think are all fiction except for this one. it is about her and her family trying to eat only things that they can buy locally or grow themselves for one year and the challenges and rewards that presents. it is full of interesting information like how most of the vegetables that we get in the us have been bred to survive long distance travel in ice trucks, so they are left with very little taste, first from the way they are bred and then after long journey. it also speaks about how we as americans are used to having any food that we want, no matter what the season. that we don’t even really know which fruits or vegetables are in season any more. i am feeling this here. for example, as some of the things that i cook require limes – humus, salsa, juices – and they are not in season here and they are hard to find - and i find myself getting annoyed about this, but they are not in season, they do not grow year round. i might try to be more conscious of this when i get back to the states.

a hindi movie, 3 idiots, is the new craze here lately. it is about 3 guys going to college in delhi and of course has songs and dancing. we listen to the sound track, which is quite good. i have only seen a couple of scenes from it and they to be translated for me – maybe one will come out with english subtitles. for my field team, i am the expert on america (which yes, i know is kind of scary). i get asked all sorts of questions – america is famous for peanut butter and jelly sandwiches? lincoln was the first black president? what happens in the bermuda triangle? michael jackson sings pop, but dances break? - um, sure, yes…

What special?

so week 2 in the house in murnad was pretty similar to the first week. no running water, power out between 6:30pm and 9:30pm, i did get a thicker bed that was much better for my bones :) i have attached a picture of some shops in the town. this man is wearing something similar to a skirt– it is pretty much like a piece of material wrapped around and then folded (like a sarong). a lot of men in the south of india wear them. they usually have a pressed button down shirt that they tuck into it. i'm not sure of the fashion rules, but the different patterns that are mixed and matched to me is kind of reminiscent of modern british fashion.

also, here is a picture of what reminds me of a prison bathroom in the house…my roommate stayed with us for a couple of days and said she was afraid something was going to eat her in there...

i am still getting stared at a lot – especially in a small town like murnad where foreigners do not pass through. i mean full on staring though, like people will stop a foot away from me and stare at me like they are trying to figure out if i am human or not…i either ignore them or smile. most of the time, they smile back - when they don’t – it’s just awkward.

again, we did 2 sites at once and got great pictures of a civet cat at one of the sites! so far all the pictures of the animals have been from the infrared camera except for one of a rat that was from the flash camera. i think that if an animal happened by the flash camera at night, it would take a great picture, but the animal would definitely not stick around. also, the motion sensors are triggered by leaves moving in the wind, so the flash camera could just be going off all night (and it does, i have many times looked through dozens of pictures of leaves…) and an animal would not approach that area if it is continually flashing. but i will continue to use both camera types and see what we get.

there is a water shortage in murnad, so the field team goes to the river a couple of times a week to wash some clothes, wash the dishes (which i am a little skeptical of), and the guys will bathe (not the women of course). sometimes the water that we do get has a yellow tinge to it and a couple of moths floating around. supposedly if you boil water it purifies it, but what about the moths? i try to figure out what i can use the water for – tea? pasta? rice? will it be boiled long enough? will bacteria seep into the food? in this region, tea and coffee are usually made only with milk. it is ironic that after doing research all day out in the coffee farms, we come back and have instant coffee mixed with milk.
at my apartment, i have water filter, but for my drinking water while out in the field, i buy 2 liters of bottled water a day – causing a buildup of plastic bottles for which there is no recycling and most likely will be burned. at home in the states, i carry a bph free reusable water bottle – it really makes you see how privileged we are to even have such a thing as the green movement. some places in the world do not even have access to clean water and we concern ourselves with the small details. not that we shouldn’t be concerned, i fully believe that we should do everything in our power to trend lightly on this earth and to use natural products without all these added chemicals, but also you have to take a step back and realize that it is only because our basic needs are met that we have the privilege to dive into the details.


after a hard week in the field, it is nice to come back to ponnampet. the neighborhood kids are so cute. they will come out of their houses to wave and say “bye” as i pass – even from the roof tops – it is really very cute. the women ask, “had your lunch? what special?” and want to look in my shopping bags. i am also learning to understand more and more the value of running water – turning on a faucet and water pouring out. i almost completely forgot the fact that at home hot water comes out of the tap. hot water is easy, you just boil it – right now i am just happy with running water.

last saturday, it was “college day” at the college of forestry. the first and second year students performed skits, comedy, songs, mimes, and dances. it was fun. they did some traditional coorgi dances that involved drums and building human pyramids. i don’t understand kannada, so the skits and comedy were lost on me. i took a couple of videos that i wish i could attach, but they are too large. here is a picture of me with asha before the festival began – i think it might be one of the only pictures of me where i am not in my field clothes and all sweaty!