ginger boys of the 80's

I’ve been spending most of my time over the last week collecting literature on dogs biting children and preparing to give a 10 (!) hour workshop on writing successful grant proposals to the staff at the NGO where I work. This is terrifying, as not only do I still have a bit of public speaking anxiety left over from my adolescence, I’ve never actually written a grant proposal in a professional setting. I’ve received training, however, which apparently qualifies me for this. So we’ll see! As I put together an effing powerpoint presentation to this end, my friend is putting together a handout for his new job, which is sensuality training for male sex workers who are employed at massage parlors in Kolkata. He’s working for an NGO that is doing all kinds of things to prevent the spread of HIV/AIDS among sex workers, and the idea behind this intervention is that if the sex happens in a more intimate and less business-like atmosphere clients will be more willing to use condoms. So while I make slides emphasizing the definition of the word “goal” he’s debating whether or not the penis on his handout should be circumcised. He got this gig because he’s friends with a lot of the employees there, he’s a badass graphic designer, and he was willing to do it for free—but I imagine all kinds of wonderful possibilities in terms of application processes and qualifications for a job like this.

The Mumbai situation seems to have finally resolved itself, with the exception of course of figuring out exactly what the bizarre mix of Indian-style terrorism with American-style high school shooting things is all about. Bombings have become sadly commonplace across India this year, but this most recent attack is incredibly weird with its deliberately chaotic execution and global politics (for terrorism in India, at least). But the surviving hostages have been released and the immediate crisis is over, so I can now proceed to tell you about my more personal recent battles with the drunken men of the Kolkata Metro System.

At least I think they were drunk. I was waiting for a train with several white American friends when one member of a pack of dudes broke away from the others and came up to us, cartoonishly impersonating a hejira as he swatted the air next to my friend’s face and said, “Hiiiiiii honnnn.” Hejira, and I’m probably using this term totally incorrectly as I picked it up from frightened bhadralok types, is generally the Hindi/Bengali term used for either a transgender or transsexual man, most specifically referring to those who dress as women and often harass people, the general population being either amused by or terrified of them. When this term was first described to me by a Bengali woman she used the word eunuch, which is actually not at all accurate as this woman (and many others of her class) primarily encounters a hejira when there is a birth in the family or a rail train is stopped at a station—groups of hejira will sweep through, demanding money lest they show you their genitals which as far as I can gather gives you some sort of bad luck. Anyway, there are dozens of terms that are more correct depending on actual gender or sexual identity as well as biology that I don’t know so we’ll not worry about it here. I’m sure this guy wasn’t actually gay, because in addition to being dressed like a dude, a fiercely heterosexual identity, he was surrounded by like 20 dude friends who thought all of this was completely hilarious. But while he rejoined them as they laughed he never broke his bizarre effeminate pantomime, swooning and fluttering his hands about his face while crooning over at our group. The whole thing was very strange. And lasted a very long time.

Once we finally got on the train, we had only a few stops until we got home so even though the train wasn’t terribly crowded I opted to stand with my companions rather than sit on the bench. About 2 minutes before we reached Kalighat station, suddenly some mid-thirties professional-looking Bengali guy shouted at me “GIRL. SIT DOWN.” I looked up at him and probably said something like “Seriously?” and he yelled the same thing at me again several more times, pointing to the bench along the side of the train. There was space open on the bench, but all sorts of people were standing, including several women, and this guy was shouting across all the people in the 5 or so feet between us. Do I just look like a complete idiot who doesn’t know what a chair is? He was definitely not being helpful, and most of the people standing around were looking at him like what the hell, guy. One member of our party got pretty pissed and walked over telling him that I could sit down if I wanted to, and thankfully the train stopped just then and we were able to herd everyone out before fisticuffs were thrown.

Occasionally weird little situations will come up where someone who’s observed me patronize their restaurant many times and continuously prove myself to be a functional adult will decide that I don’t understand how to use a fork (which isn’t even a utensil really used in India anyways outside of schmancy restaurants) and very elaborately show me how to do so. Because I can be a completely impatient person, this type of thing is quite annoying, but I understand that they guy’s trying to be helpful and I’m gracious about it. But other times, people are just assholes, and this week I’m pretty tired of it. Whatever. Bharatland and I aren’t getting along too well right now, but I get a magical wonderful guest on Tuesday and I shall buck up and show her all the glory Bengal has to offer. Sleeper-class train cars! The Himalayas! Precious street dogs! Populist rhetoric! Men coughing up sputum by the water pump at 1 am! GORKHALAND!