John Deere owns company buses in India. These busses drive around Pune every morning and pick up workers to take to the office or to the factory. We borrowed one of the busses for our Saturday excursion.
We drove about an hour from Pune to where the air is a little fresher and the spaces a little more open. We had made reservations to spend the day on a "farm" (where else would a bunch of John Deere employees want to go?). We arrived and the "farm" and were vastly disappointed initially. It was really just some family's house with a moderately big yard (by Indian standards - it was still smaller than our yard in Bettendorf).
Our plans were to play cricket in the morning, but the lack of space for a cricket field quickly dashed that idea. We still got our the cricket bat and knocked the ball around a little, but couldn't really play a lot. Cricket is by far the biggest sport in India. I had never played, but it's similar enough to baseball that I didn't have any trouble.
After the cricket play and some breakfast, we played another game called kibida (I think). It's a game where all the players are in a box (about 10 yards x 10 yards). There are two teams which each stay in one end of the box. One player from one side crosses the mid line and tries to tag players from the other team then make it back across the line. Players from the other team try to detain the player that crossed and keep him from crossing the line back to his side. If the player makes it back across every player he touched is out. If the player doesn't make it back across he is out. First team to run out of players loses. I enjoyed that game - it was pretty physical though.
After the kibida game we went on a "trek" (a.k.a hike) up a mountain behind the farm. It was a pretty good hike to the top but offered some really nice views from the top. It's the hazy time of year in India (just after the rainy season) so the views weren't as nice as they could have been. We saw a wild four foot long cobra on the way up and some other wildlife I'd never before seen (like a scarab - a big bug). As always there were plenty of cows around.
The peak in the distance is our treking destination.
Here's the whole group about half way up the hike.
This was our guide on the hike and view from the top.
After the hike we were all pretty tired, so we lounged a bit on the porch of the farmhouse. They let me use one of the traditional cots and take a short nap. After lunch someone asked - what are we going to do now? The leader of the group said, "Now we drink beer and dance!" So we all went into the farmhouse in the living area (also the kids bedroom) and drank beer and danced. Only about half of the group drank beer - the other half were observing a period of abstinence from alcohol and other things during a religious festival that's going on now. I'll let you speculate which half of the group I was in!
I was expecting the dancing to be some traditional dancing that they were going to teach us Americans. Turned out they just wanted to dance. So the music and dance styles were very much like Americans dance - some disco, some techno, some of everything. The music was Indian pop music - similar to American pop. The strange thing was that there were no women in the group. Just a bunch of guys dancing. It's very normal here for guys to get together and dance and girls to get together and dance separately. You'll also often see guys holding hands with each other walking down the street. It doesn't mean they're homosexual - it's just part of the culture and accepted and normal here. They persuaded me to dance a little - though I never was much for dancing so did as little as possible!
After the dancing we piled into the bus and returned to Pune. Because of the festival the roads in Pune were very crowded and it took a long time to get back to the hotel. Indians love to sing, so all the way they sang Indian songs - some traditional, some modern. Everybody took a turn so of course I had to have my turn. I sang "Old MacDonald had a farm". It was a big hit.
It was a really fun day altogether. I was fun to see the kinds of things the people here enjoy doing. It's altogether very similar to what young people in the U.S enjoy doing.
3 comments:
Sounds like a very interesting day. Too bad you didn't have any video of you dancing and singing! The view from the top of the hike looks really pretty (even with the haze).
You are a better sport than I am. I am afraid the cobra would have been the end of my hike. I have been known to turn and run from snakes that may have been rattlers and may have been harmless gopher snakes.
Sounds like you had wonderful time in India. Its heartening to read about your experiences. I have been through many of your posts about your India trip. All are decently detailed and full of information.
Some of your dance moves would have been a rarity. Hopefully you will again get a crazy enough company to persuade you to dance and catch it on camera.
The Kibida is actually called Kabaddi. Half of your playmates might had been playing the game for the first time in their life. In fact, I haven't played it myself yet. Must have been a great fun.
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