Shouts and Whispers

I saw my very first Indian riot last Friday. I was supposed to go saree shopping with my Indian friend Kasturi, so we arranged to meet outside the local supermarket. As I was walking there I noticed that all the stores were closed, which is unusual even on holidays. I saw a group of motorcyclists at the intersection, shouting and whistling - I thought that something might have happened, like a minor accident. Even the US State Department advises travelers to run away from the scene of an accident because of the possibility of an assault by onlookers, so I thought they might be about to take down a rickshaw driver. But, when I reached the supermarket, I realized they had a different target. The shop had a sign on its closed metal gate saying it would open at 10:30, and it was already 12. A security guard kept lifting the gate halfway and then bringing it down again. A few minutes later I understood why: the motorcyclists arrived and started throwing stones at the door. I thought it had something to do with the Muslim holiday of Eid, and that perhaps the Muslims were angry that shops were open on a holy day (the day Abraham almost sacrificed Isaac). But I found out later that they were part of a general strike against the evangelist Benny Hinn, who had the support of the government in his three-day "pray for India" session on an airfield in Bangalore. He promised to cure the sick and generally bless everyone, and non-Christians were angry.

On Saturday I attended the Sports Day at the school for the deaf, which was quite a loud affair. I wore my first saree, but unfortunately I didn't get any photos. The kids took part in a number of fun races, such as the Funny Bunny competition, in which the smaller children had to run up to a table and then eat a carrot. The first one to finish the carrot won.

Saturday night we had a party at our house. I invited friends from the sign language institute, so there were about 5 deaf people and 5 hearing. The Indian people said they had never seen sign language before, so I was happy that they learned something. We had a good time and I met Gilles' new friend from work, Anne-Julie, a charming French history student. On Saturday our friends from Macromedia took us bowling; I embarrassed myself as usual. We had a very late dinner at a Chinese restaurant, where I was shocked to discover there are Chinese people who don't know how to cook rice.

Today I was ready to find my deaf village at last, so I went to the Sign Language Institute to meet with the coordinator, who knows a journalist at the TV station that broadcast the original story. She told me to arrive at 10, but when I got there she had not yet come in. Half an hour later she arrived with a policeman and a man in handcuffs. He was a deaf man from the countryside who murdered his brother. They called in one of the deaf instructors to interpret from his gestures into sign language, and then the coordinator wrote down his confession. The police had even brought the murder weapon with them, a long stick! At 12 they left to see the crime scene, and handed me the confession to type up. I have to say, this is the most involvement I have ever had in police work!

They left and I chatted with two very nice students of sign language who turned out to be Jehova's witnesses. They asked me if I was interested in the Bible so I tried to make bypass the topic discreetly by saying I was Jewish. They asked if my father was a big banker, and I didn't get why until much later in the conversation! They told me that Jews were all right but were unfortunately cursed for not accepting Jesus. Only Jesus is not God for their church either. I didn't quite get it and didn't really want to go into details, but I was surprised to learn that the man's family had been members of that religion for 5 generations.

I thought I had made an escape when I went to lunch with some other deaf guys. We went next door to the canteen, and I was amused to see the kids from the oral school attached to the Speech and Hearing Institute signing to each other. They all knew the deaf teacher and asked him if I was deaf. I tried to explain that I spoke, but didn't speak their language (Kannada). I'm sure they thought I was deaf. Halfway through lunch I realized that my deaf friends were all members of the mormon church. They have been quite successful in converting deaf people in Bangalore, though they all seem to drink coffee and tea. Some habits die hard.

The secretary's daughter arrived and charmed me into looking for chocolate for her and making her a butterfly out of paper. Finally, around 4:30 the crew came back with the police. The deaf man was back home, and would be taken into jail tomorrow. The interpreters explained to me that he probably wouldn't go to prison for long, since his parents would bail him out. Since he killed his own brother, there would be no one to prosecute him, and he would go free as long as the fine was paid. He might even marry his brother's widow, who has a three-month-old baby!

We did finally make it to the TV station, where the journalist we had wanted to see raced by us on her way to report on an all-night concert. We were introduced to the regional manager, who offered to help us and vaguely recalled the report. Hopefully he will be able to tell us more about the deaf village and even give us a video tape. I'll just have to wait and see...