University of Manitoba: Travel Study to India

Delhi, Agra, and Jaipur (“Golden Triangle”) will be our introduction to the incredible juxtaposition of histories and cultures that is India. “New” Delhi, Edwin Lutyens’ incredible sandstone and marble celebration of British power and the contrasting simple memorial at the site of Mahatma Gandhi’s cremation, will be the foci of our study of modern India. Shah Jahan’s capital, old Delhi (along fabled Chandni Chowk, the call to prayer from the Jama Masjid mingles with the sights and sounds and smells of the spice market), and Agra’s Taj Mahal (exquisite ethereal tomb Shah Jahan built for the love of his life), will draw us into Mughal India. As we stroll through the “Ghost City” of Fathepur Sikri we will learn of the syncretic faith Akbar the Great cobbled together there and blended into the very architecture of the red sandstone buildings. Rajastan’s “pink city” of Jaipur, with its wondrous palaces and amazingly accurate Jantar Mantar Observatory will bring us into the world of the Rajput Maharajas.

During two weeks in North Bengal, activity will be centred, initially, in the town of Darjeeling. Nestled in the Himalayan foothills at an altitude of 7000 feet, the “Queen of the Hill Stations” is renowned for its scenery, tea gardens, hospitality, unique “Toy Train”, and incredible collection of schools. Our University’s Memorandum of Understanding with St. Joseph’s Jesuit College, gives us privileged access to the “hills”. We will come to know the remarkable people behind the 19^th century imposing gothic Jesuit boarding and day school at North Point and the ecologically sustainable Bamboo School on a remote Tea Garden financed by North Point alumni and friends. Behind the grey concrete exterior of Hayden Hall in the town’s bazaar, we will meet Canadian Jesuit, Edgar Burns, and experience a grassroots social service agency focussed on empowering women. At Jesu Ashram, in Matigara, we will interact with a caring staff of nurses and volunteers serving the poorest of the poor, including those with TB, Aids, and leprosy. Here too we will spend time in a school serving the children of Bangladeshi refugees who break rocks into gravel (by hand) for survival. In Kalimpong, Gandhi Ashram’s “Fiddlers on the Thatch”, children of the poorest forest dwellers, will inspire us. In education, health care, and cooperative ventures of all kinds, we learn from grassroots animators as they work alongside India’s urban and rural poor in their daily struggles and efforts to control their own destinies.

At the end of an overnight train journey on the fabled Darjeeling Mail, we step out of Sealdah Station into Kolkata — Kipling’s “city of the dreadful night” as well as Dominique Lapierre’s “city of joy”. From Mother Teresa’s tomb and her Home for the Dying at the Kali Temple, to life and death along the banks of the Hooghly River, Kolkata will challenge, amaze, and inspire, as no other place can. A major focus of our experience will be Loreto Day School, widely recognized in India as a model for equality-based educational change and the centre of a remarkable set of outreach programs. 300 “Rainbow” street children who call Loreto’s roof their home, scores of Barefoot Teachers, and 1100 students who become teachers themselves at age 10, offer educational and social programs that touch the lives of at least 250,000 of the poorest of the poor in Kolkata.

Leaving Kolkata on Aug 14, we stop in Varanasi (Benares) on the Ganges River, the religious centre of the Hindu world. The site of pilgrims doing their pujas at the ghats along the Ganges, against the back drop of the ageless temples, is an impression that will remain with you long after our visit.

Everywhere in India, our senses, minds, and hearts will be overwhelmed! From Hindu pilgrims in their thousands along the roads to persistent beggars everywhere, from the chaotic and noisy traffic of Delhi and Kolkata to the quiet peace in a Jain Temple and the misty hill paths of Darjeeling, the timeless mystery, and incredible diversity of India awaits!