Indian Movie Theaters

Yes, movie theaters here are amazing as there is air conditioning! Hallu-fricken'-lulla! Anyway, I will explain why I am talking about Indian movie theaters today.

The reasons for today's topic is that we went to see a movie today and this has been our third one since we've been here. There are some interesting differences between movie theaters here, and movie theaters in America, and this is the reason why I'm writing about this. We had gone to see How to Train a Dragon 2, and it was really good. We've also seen a Telugu movie called Manam. I recommend that you try to and find some way to watch it. And we had watched in Telugu without English subtitles, so we were unable to understand the more complex implications due to the language barrier, but we could get the basic idea of what was going on thanks to wonderful acting, body language, and many other things. So, yes...try and watch this movie! The first movie that we had actually watched here was the last X-Men movie that came out around the end of May, X-Men: Days of Future Past.

Now, first things first. You know how movies, in the past, were really long and a big event and you had intermissions and things like that? That had carried on here in India. Movies here, no matter the length, have intermissions. We didn't know this! We were watching X-Men, and it was at a really great part, it was building up to the climax of the movie! And...the movie stopped, the lights came up, and people started moving around and started talking a bit. We all, at first, thought that the power had gone out and the back-up generators had kicked in, as by this time we were used to the power going out. But then people started to talk even more and going out in droves! We were so CONFUSED!!! But then we realized that people were coming back, and that people didn't seem at all worried, and that's when it kicked in that we were in an intermission. We had never experienced an intermission...in a movie theater...ever! So, that was definitely something that was new and interesting to experience here about movie theaters.

Another thing, Indians here are very concerned about the dangers of smoking and alcohol. Like, really concerned! When when watching X-Men, you know how Wolverine smokes cigars so much? Well, everything he did, a big sign would show up on the bottom of the screen saying "Smoking/tobacco use is injurious to health." This also doesn't happen in the United States, and it was just really interesting to see that happen. This also happened in Manam, when there was drinking going on the screen, a small series of words in Telugu would show up in the lower left-hand corner basically saying "drinking alcohol is injurious to health." This also doesn't show up in American movies, but I think that these two things should be considered for American movies, if only in small letters in bottom corner of the screen.

Oh! and getting into the movie is process as well. You head into the movie theater, and you have to be screened, to make sure you not carrying any dangerous objects. Or cameras for that matter. And you know how here in America, you not supposed to sneak food into the movie theater but the majority of people do anyway? Well, that would not fly here. Your bags are checked and so there is no sneaking in food...not all at.

So yeah, that's all I basically wanted to talk about, the basic differences of Indian movie theaters vs. American movie theaters and it's all very interesting. Just some things to think about.

Talk to you soon,
Ashley

Marriage and Dating...What Can I Say?

Yes, I doing marriage and dating as my blog topic today, but for a really good reason, I promise.

So, as you should all know by now, I'm in India. Without my husband no less. Now there are two more girls that are also without their husbands. For the last bit, there is a married couple here that are here. Now, so we have three single members, a girl with a boyfriend, and all the rest of us who are married. My research deals a lot with marriage, as I am studying marriage traditions of the castes here and so this will sometimes lead to my informants telling me about how they met their prospective husbands/wives. Something that you should know about the culture of India is that there is no socially sanctioned form of "dating" here. Like, you do not date. That is not what you do in order to decide if you want to marry someone. Your parents will arrange who you will marry, and for the most part, you will not know who that person until you are married.

So, Oliver, one of the single guys here, we've been teasing about having Rajalakshmi match him for a Hindu marriage while he is here. We only do this because we get such a great reaction out of him and he'll play along with it too, it's great! Anyway, as we were doing this today, the subject of dating came up and then Westen started asking Rajalakshmi about how love marriages came about, so I got called in to handle this part of the subject, due to my previous research as well as the few interviews that I got before I changed my subject. I'll have to say...no matter what I said, they were confused on how people got to know each other before they got married, especially with love marriages. But I explained to the best of my ability, and they seemed intrigued by the idea that there was no dating here in India. It's socially forbidden to do so.

Comparing this idea to what it is we do in America, it is two VERY different worlds of love. Here, in America, we date, we hang out, we do so many things! just to find the one person that we could find that we could picture ourselves living with the rest of the our lives. It's an interesting concept, when you think about it. We, as humans in America, do these strange activities with other members of our own species in order to figure out if we want to, basically, mate with them. In India, the parents choose who you will mate and then the deal is sealed. Done and done. There's not a big fuss made out of it, they agree to the marriage and the marriage is set and then they get married.

I know that this may seem like a strange topic for today, to reflect on marriage and dating. Forgive me though, with me missing Richard as well as talking about marriage and dating and then having several girls here without their husbands and then a married couple. All on one trip. Marriage and dating comes up a lot with us.

Talk to you soon,
Ashley

It's Been a While...

Yeah, I'm sorry guys, it's been a while since I last wrote on here. I apologize for those of you that have been looking forward to hearing all of what it is that I've been doing and all it is that I am excited about. But I've got to be honest with you...there really hasn't been a lot that has been going on with me these past few days. I haven't had any more interviews, I haven't been able to move forward in my study, or anything else for this has been going on. But we've been going to some pretty good views and places to visit. So I've been able to get some great pictures at least!

Like yesterday, we all went to a dance performance. Now that was super interesting. It was an old classical Indian style of dance called "kuchipudi". I would recommend that you look it up, as it's really cool. The story of the dance was about a young girl married off to an old man for a large dowry. This happened a lot in the classical age of India, so it was an interesting performance. And throughout, there wasn't any talking, not a lot anyway. What there was, was done by the singers of the performance. It was really amazing! I loved watching it, sadly, I was unable to enjoy it as much as I wanted to as I was hungry and tired. I felt like I was going to sleep for about half the time. And the papprazzi was going crazy in front. They don't stand in the back and take pictures from there, like they do in America, but they stand in front of the stage and block the view of all of those that sit in the front row... a.k.a US! That was slightly annoying, as it was hard to see what was going on sometimes, and their flashes were really bright, so they would blind us when they took pictures of us sometimes.

But other than that, there's not a lot going on, just getting things going with my study. For those of you that are reading this, know that my study is about cross-caste marriage. Well, I've only had two interviews and I've been here about four, almost five weeks. It's not going anywhere, no one wants to talk to me me, as cross-caste marriage, while it is legal by law, culturally, it is still a forbidden form of marriage. So no one wants to talk to me about their cross-caste marriage. So, as I need the information that I get here for my senior thesis, I need to change my study. So I'm changing my study to marriage traditions of endogamous caste marriages. It not being a form of forbidden marraige, more people should be more willing to talk to me.

So, that's been me for this past little bit. I hope that all is going well with everyone back home.

Talk to you soon,
Ashley

P.S. as soon as the wifi works, and I can get my pictures uploaded online, I'll do a blog post that is fully pictures, promise!