India at a Glance -- Part 3: You Lookin' At Me?

by Clark

You’d think with the attention we garner here that we’re celebrities. We expected the attention—the staring—to a certain point; we realize that in India, two white people carrying all our possessions on our backs must be something of a novelty. We are a curiosity, an oddity to be examined.

But there is a limit. At least, we’ve got a limit.

One of the more irritating aspects of the attention is the picture taking. No, not us taking pictures of them; it’s the other way around. The way we figure it, loads of Western tourists come expecting that National Geographic-quality picture of pain and suffering in the developing world. If we were professional photographers, we could maybe justify exploiting these people that way by hiding behind the veil of professionalism. As it is, we see it as an intrusion into their lives, and it makes us uncomfortable to whip the camera out to capture people going about their daily routines. But they have no such qualms with us. They take full advantage of the fact that we’re on their turf, and snap away!

We’ve had people sneak photos of us on their camera phones; others wait until we’ve got our backs turned so that we’re not looking, and end up with a photo of our bums – how impressive! Some people go to all the trouble of setting up a distraction with a friend so that their photo captures us in the same frame as their buddy—we’ve even had people sit down next to us, pretending to rest, while someone else takes a picture of us all together! Katherine has had wide-eyed, grubby babies shoved into her arms in front of the Taj Mahal for that oh-so-special, once-in-a-lifetime photo op. It’s ridiculous. I don’t take photos of tourists back home—so what gives?

It has been suggested by other travelers that there are a couple of reasons for snapping photos of unsuspecting Western tourists. One is that the Indians then take these photos and try to pass them off as if they’ve got some nice Canadian friends that came to visit them in India; this subsequently results in some form of elevated social status for them. The other possible explanation that was afforded us was that unscrupulous businessmen will print the photos and use them for false advertising, pulling Western tourists in with assurances that other Westerners have taken their tour or used their services in the past. “See? Here’s a picture of me with them. Don’t they look happy?” Or perhaps it simply boils down to the fact that the majority of locals will never have the opportunity to travel and see the white man in his natural habitat. Whether or not any of these reasons are true can be left to the debate of scholars and gentlemen—while in India, I didn’t feel like I was either.

And if you ever do want to take a picture of an Indian, even if it’s their initiative, they start to demand money. “Twenty rupees!” is the common demand. So after a few days of noticing that Indians were snapping pictures of us, rather than give them the finger in the photo, we would just run up to them and yell, “Fifty rupees! Fifty rupees for my photo!”

The low status of women in this country is extremely maddening, and creates some annoyances for western women. Katherine could at least take some respite in the fact that she was traveling with a male companion, but we have met women traveling solo or in twos who are just completely exhausted from warding off the hungry eyes and physical harassment (luckily, Katherine hasn’t yet had to slap anyone for that reason). We’ve found many a solo female traveler here hiding out in a nice guesthouse for a few days at a time, recuperating and regaining the strength to face the staring and the catcalls again.

The staring. Not solely reserved for women, the constant staring really grated on us both, but I have to admit it was worse for Katherine. I’ve mentioned that we’re a curiosity here, but it’s more than that. We’re not just a passing curiosity; in India, men will purposefully move all the way across a train station to stand three feet away from you for a really juicy stare. (And it’s always the men; women don’t go to all the trouble just to get a good, unobstructed stare in.) Men will move seats on the train to come closer and gaze at you, a hollow sort of ogle that starts to make you feel uncomfortable. One man actually stole someone else’s seat so he could sit directly opposite Katherine. It can really unnerve a person. It did us.

And you know what? We can tolerate a certain amount of staring. Seriously, we’re the minority here. We understand that. But the hunger in these men’s eyes for Katherine as they mentally undress her is enough to throw me into overprotection mode. In fact, if it weren’t for Katherine, I would have eventually hit someone. The thing is, she beat me to it.

We tried to keep our cool; it’s pretty tough. Four days into the trip, with an upper-respiratory infection and lack of sleep induced by a twelve hour second-class open-window sleeper car train journey, Katherine finally reached her limit. Her breaking point was the Ajanta Caves, where a precious-gem peddler kept following her and trying to coax her into his shop. He actually waited by the park entry gate to make sure to latch on to her once we were back in the bazaar area, and watched us eat lunch in the hopes that she would bend under all this pressure. Tired, hungry, and feeling sick, Katherine finally turned and yelled at him, right to his face. It was completely effective. The dude didn’t know what to do. In retrospect, we think it totally shocked the guy that a woman would exert any authority over him.

But the first time she ever hit anyone was a couple of days later, when we jumped off a train at 11 PM and were making our way to the overnight resting rooms (our train connection was at 5 AM the next morning). The usual assortment of pushy taxi and rickshaw drivers met us at the train door as we disembarked, asking us where we wanted to go and suggesting they could take us to a hotel. Two of them latched onto us and no amount of stern, “No,” or “No, thank you, we’re not leaving the train station,” could deter them. When they started to follow us up the staircase, still insisting on giving us a ride somewhere, Katherine finally turned to one of them and screamed, “NOOOO! We don’t need your goddamn ride!” and shoved the man into the railing. Stunned, the man turned to his fellow taxi drivers, and part-screamed, part-laughed his way out of the station. I’m not sure if he knew what hit him. But it didn’t matter. It was a rather cathartic way for Katherine to vent all her Indian frustrations in one fell swoop.

As for the staring, we’ve found our way of dealing with it. If a smile doesn’t break the ice, we just stare back. Blatantly. Seeing the men squirm under a direct stare is perversely satisfying. Sometimes, it’s that satisfaction that gets us through our day.

The best instance of this occurred as we waited for a late night train (one of many). A young Indian man, probably in his mid-teens, came across the platform and sat directly across from us and stared right at Katherine. I’m not sure if he even blinked. After gracefully giving him a few minutes to get his fill, Katherine turned towards him, arms crossed, and stared right back. When he started to wriggle, she asked him, “What’s the matter? Don’t like getting stared at?” He looked at her, wild-eyed, shocked that he was being spoken to. “Didn’t your mother ever teach you that staring is rude? Well, it’s rude! Go away!”

That put an end to that. We were left in relative peace until our train rumbled into the station.