Well this is my first blog, so I am not sure where to start. I am a Canadian citizen -- a student actually. I came to the Himalayan region of India at first to study Hindi as a pre-requisite for my PhD in Anthropology. But then I fell in love with this mountainous region, the villages and the people. My Indian friends here and my friends and family at home in Canada used to tease me and say that I was going to spend my life here in India. I laughed at them, and told them that while I would love nothing better, it was entirely out of the question. You have to be an Indian citizen to live here. But as fate would have it, completely out of left field my future husband appeared one evening at my door step and there was just something about his eyes, and the way he spoke that captured my attention. After courting for just a few months, we decided we should marry. So now, I am sitting here in the front room of our house, located in the small Jaunpur village of Sainji. 'Now where is Sainji? And what is Jaupur?' You ask. Well, Sainji is not far from the Indian Himalayan Hill station of Mussoorie -- the 'Queen of the Hills' as it is commonly referred to. We are in the Jaupur block of the newly formed state of Uttarakhand, formally a part of Uttarpradesh.

Uttarakhand lies in the Central region of the Himalayas. It has two divisions, the Garhwal and Kumaun. The Garhwal region, where we are located, stretches over an area of 29, 968 km², and is comprised of seven territories: Uttarkashi, Chamoli, Pauri, Tehri, Rudra Prayag, Hardwar, and Dehradun. The terrain is characterized by steep terraced hillsides traversed by several streams and rivers, including the Yamuna and the Ganga. It has long been called Devbhoomi, "abode of the gods", and is home to some of India’s holiest Hindu shrines. For more than a thousand years, pilgrims from all over India have made the long trek to visit the numerous holy shrines and temples scattered throughout the region.

The Garhwal territory of Tehri is further divided into Jaunpur and Jaunsar-Bawar and Rawain districts which are situated along the Yamuna River. The village of Sainji is located in the Jaunpur district, and is just one hour’s drive from the famous hill station of Mussoorie. The village is home to just 300 people of Jaunpuri descent. Jaunpuri people are Hindu, but like their Jaunsar-Bawar neighbours on the opposite side of the Yamuna River; they are set apart from the more common form of Hinduism practiced in the plains by their culture, language (Jaunpuri), caste organization, diet (meat eaters) worship of local deities, traditional marriage practices, festivals, dancing, dress, architecture, agricultural system, and animal husbandry. You can visit our website at www.kanhaiyahouse.ca if you want to learn more about this area.

So I have been living here for almost two years now. I am trying to write my dissertation, but I am like a vulture right now -- circling my prey -- trying to figure out the best approach before I dive in and tackle it. So I guess this blog is a way of helping me process my thoughts. Everyday that I am in the village I am inundated with new experiences that I have to process, and it is not easy at all. People talk of experiencing culture shock when they visit foriegn countries. I experience it all the time. It is an adjustment -- living in a small village where the culture is so different. It is not just the culture, but learning to understand a whole different way of thinking and doing things.

As an anthropologist I was first working and living in the small village of Kolti, just a few kilometers down the mountain from Mussoorie. I had to walk about 1 1/2 hours down the mountain to reach the village. Despite it's close proximity to Mussoorie (just 3 kilometers) this village might as well have been 300 kilometers away.

Jaunpuri people hold fast to their local traditions. Houses are made of wood and are colourfully painted, and on the walls of some of the older homes dating back some five hundred years, carvings can be found depicting Jaunpur’s ancestral connections with Rajasthan from the time of the Mogul empire when Rajasthani Hindus exited Rajasthan on mass and migrated into the Himalayan Hill Regions. Women continue to wear colourful pleated skirts and blouses. And on any given evening the young people will gather outside in the local square, despite the cold frosty air to sing the local folk songs.

The fifty families who live in Kolti and Ladhure practice a unique subsistence strategy that is truly representative of the Garhwal region. For six months out of the year, during the growing season most families migrate from Kolti to Ladhure where they tend their crops on the steeply terraced hillsides. During the winter months they return to Kolti which is located on the sunny side of the mountain and is much warmer in the winter months than Ladhure.

Despite the rich traditional aspects of the village, life is very difficult for everyone. At one time people were able to meet their daily needs through subsistence agriculture. However, in recent decades population growth coupled with long-term exploitation of natural ecosystems in the Himalayas (i.e. the extraction of forests by the British and later the Indian Government) has resulted in scarcities of water, food, fodder and fuel, making it difficult for everyone living in this region to maintain even a subsistence existence. Because of the system of land inheritance whereby land is divided evenly amongst sons, and population growth since the 1960s’ (largely due to immunization and the consequent decrease in child mortality rates) field crops are small and most people can no longer survive on what they produce. Hence, nowadays people must purchase much of what they consume. In Uttarakhand this has led to an increased incidence of under nutrition. Recent studies indicate that roughly 80% of the children living in the Garhwal region are malnourished. The hill regions are also adversely affected by: difficult mountain terrain; poor natural resources; dependence on uncertain rains; the high cost of economic development in the region; and lack of and generally poorly maintained roads; all of which contribute to endemic poverty.

For virtually all of the families living in Kolti, meeting even the basic daily requirements is a struggle. Since there is no road linking the villages to the major markets, the men of the villages travel each day five kilometres up the mountain to the hill station of Mussoorie to sell their produce. They are limited in what they can sell by what they can carry on their backs or, if they are fortunate to own one, by what their mule can carry. Owning a mule is certainly an asset, but can be a costly one should the mule happen to lose its’ footing on the steep mountain side, as was the case recently for one unfortunate villager who had only recently purchased his mule for a staggering amount of $500.00 which he borrowed from the village cooperative. Last week the mule lost its footing on the mountain and broke both its legs. Hence the mule had to be destroyed, and the villager is at a loss as to how to repay his loan, and also how to support his family of six children.

Winters are cold in Kolti and the growing season extends only from April to October. Few foods are stored for winter, and as winter sets in, most vegetables are sold for cash to buy staple foods such as rice, dhal, tea, and sugar. In the winter months, men on average find work for no more than 15 days a month, earning about $2.50 per day, barely enough to purchase one day’s food ration for a family of five.

Maintaining adequate is difficult in the village. Animals are housed beside or below residential quarters, such that animal excrement and flies are rampant within the village. Cooking takes place inside the homes over an open hearth. Hence, the rooms are smoky and eye infections are common. Water has to be carried from the local well, and no houses have toilets or bathing facilities. People bathe and defecate in the open outside of their houses.

Health care in the region is non existent. Government hospitals do not recognize these villages as part of their jurisdiction because they do not have a road. Most charity outreach programs only service those villages with road access. At the same time it is not possible for the sick and the elderly to make the steep climb to the hospital, nor do people have the funds to pay for health care. As a result, the incidence and death rate from diseases such as tuberculosis, diarhoea, or treatable disorders such as gull stones, or appendicitis is quite high. Children also suffer from many respiratory infections, fevers, dental problems, and skin diseases.

I settled here and began my research, focused on how children understood their situations and responded in accordance to their limited resources. I did not realize it at the time, but being an outsider actually provided me with much inside information, and flexibility in my research. People regarded me as something of a novelty and hence I was always invited inside people houses, offered cups of chai, and people also liked to come to my house to see how I lived. Conversations with Kolti people revealed a great deal of information. People seemed happy to share their thoughts with me. However, I cannot be sure that all of the information I was given was accurate. That is the beauty of anthropology; we don't take everything we are told as truth. Much of what is observed is weighed against what people tell us. Nonetheless, life as a researcher in this area, in the capacity of a foreigner and outsider seemed relatively simple.

After marrying into the village of Sainji, life as a researcher began to change. I had decided half way into my research in Kolti that I needed to do a comparative study with a village that had benefited over the years from development projects. Sainji seemed like the perfect study sight. At first I thought, 'Oh great, now that I am married into this village I will be privy to information that I may not have gotten having been an outsider.' I miscalculated that assumption by a mile! I quickly learned that being married into the village meant that I was now not just a new daughter-in-law, but that I was now part of a family within a village that has a history of disputes and hence political alignments among families. So I learned over time that there are some families who are very friendly with us, some who are neutral and others who keep there distance. As a researcher, this means that I can no longer randomly interact with people. If I try to engage someone in conversation about a research topic I run the risk of being misunderstood as trying to collect private information from them. Hence, I am shut out. On the other hand, if the village person happens to be on friendly terms with our family then I often am more privy to information -- as one lady commented to me one day, 'you are one of us now, so I am telling you the truth as I know it.'

I am also constantly battling the desire to be of assistance to the villagers and trying not to become a 'well of financial assistance'. I experienced this to a limited extent when I was in Kolti, but now that I am married into Sainji, I find that both my husband and I are inundated with requests from people requiring financial assistance. We don't mind helping where there is need, but we also have to watch our resources. I am living off a student grant at the moment. We have started a 'cultural stay business' as well, but it is slow to get going, so we have to be careful with our finances. In the meantime we have started a NGO to try to help the villagers, but so far the lines between our personal contributions and what is given through the NGO seemed to be merged together as one in the same, by the villagers. We keep a supply of medicines on hand, paid for from our own pocket, and we offer medicine for basic needs when someone asks. But lately it seems people think that we have received funding for their benefit and that it is their right that we should provide them with medicines, pay for their hospital stays, or whatever other needs they may have. This makes life difficult at times...... Yet, the other side of things is my own desire to overlook the expectations and to offer assistance when I can. The other day we assisted with a health camp run by the local hospital for our area. One of the villagers had come to us the night before and asked if we could help an old lady in the village who has no family. She said the woman had something wrong with her leg and needed an operation. Feeling financially pinched I turned to my husband for help. He told the villager that the woman should go to the clinic and let the doctor decide what should be done. The next day when we were leaving the clinic we saw the old woman on the road. She had not come to the clinic because she didn't know about it. So we loaded her in the car and took her back to the sight of the clinic, where the medical crew were just finishing their lunch. The doctor agreed to look at the woman's leg, and my God, she has been carrying around a four inch diameter, six inch long tumour. The doctor thinks it is benign. He asked the lady how long she had had it for, and she answered 'about 30 years.' So yes, somehow we will find a way to foot the bill for her surgery, and we will take responsibility for her well-being. Poor soul, she has no one else. How can we refuse?