Morning Prayer

Good morning India!

Before your sun rises this morning, I race through your streets on the back of a speeding, swerving, dipping, dodging two-wheeler. Some of your children are still asleep on the sidewalks, dirt caked into callouses, heads dipped into chests to avoid the steady rainfall. Guards meander their monotonous back-and-forths, pausing to kick a soda can, answer a text or two. Packs of stray dogs begin to disperse and groggy auto-rickshaw drivers stretch out their legs in preparation for another day of waiting. 

Wind whips across my face, blows my head scarf back farther and farther, showing more and more of my white skin and light hair. India is mine at this moment. Finding solace in the empty streets, straining to hear the silence I had begun to forget existed.

But as the sun rises and we drive farther into old Pune, your sleeping temple begins to quiver and your children begin their days. Countless newspapers in an assortment of languages are stacked, sorted, distributed, carried on the front of two-wheelers by young men protecting them from the monsoon with out-stretched parkas. And then I see them. Hundreds and hundreds of worshippers who had risen before me. Decked with offerings of coconuts, rupees, and flowers, they approach the Ganapati temple, haltingly moving in a winding procession of faith. The temple is temporary, the structure erected just prior to Ganapati and will be dismantled quickly after the 10-day holiday. But "temporary" does not give it justice. It is adorned with glistening chandeliers, a pure silver-eared Ganapati, paintings and statues, jewels and precious metals, holy men waiting to bless those who give. This glistening, vibrant, iridescent, and entirely temporary temple is flanked on either side by derelict and crumbling buildings. Stadium lights positioned on the tops of neighboring buildings light the temple throughout the night and well into the morning, but manage to keep the surrounding poverty in the shadows. 

I struggle with the clasp on my sandals and finally manage to slip them off, leaving them among the others at the side of the procession. Tucking my hair back under my scarf and adjusting my kurta, I take my place in line. Shift forward, pause, press, strain, wait, in ensemble.

"What is your name?" 

I glance down to the little girl beside me who stands giggling with her other friends. Open eyes, full smile.

"Alison! What is your name?"

She takes a photo of me and runs away, giggling excitedly at the image of a lone white girl standing in the sea of brown faces.

Push, shove, force, calmly in ensemble towards the stage. Give your bag to the soldier at the side, walk through the entirely defunct metal detector, reach back for your bag, continue forward. I reach the front and snap pictures of Ganapati, trying to capture an image that I do not understand. Continue the push and exit the temple. Fulfilled? Potentially.

Your country confuses me, bewilders me, discomforts me, terrifies me. It excites me, surprises me, and stubbornly nudges me into an adoration and understanding that I do not know if I am yet ready to accept.