Shopping and Shuttling (Cindy)

Getting around India, or at least Maharashtra, the state we’re working and traveling in, is pretty easy—we either take rickshaws or the train. Rickshaws are quite the experience—they are like small, cute cabs that are open on the sides—so you get a nice breeze when riding in them! They have three wheels and instead of a steering wheel, motorcycle-like handlebars, and they can fit through the narrowest of streets! The best part is they’re super cheap…most of our rides are about 50 rupees, just over a dollar, and there’s no tipping system. India also has a very good train system, but it’s different from what we’re used to, to say the least! There are cars specifically for women, which is nice—wonder if those would be popular at home??




















Food vendors, selling items like ice cream, fruit, Indian snacks and sweets (chikki) come through before the train takes off, and It’s sometimes hard to get a seat because of the crowds (India contains about 16% of the world’s population on less than 3% of the land). The cars are cooled with fans, not A/C, and fresh air from the open doors (can you imagine the lawsuits if the doors on American trains traveled like that?), and are filled with women in saris, some bare feet (that’s everywhere!) and Hindi gossip!

One of our latest trips took us to Pune, the second biggest city in the state next to Mumbai. We had shopping on the brain, and met up with some of our new friends from the ashram for a true Indian shopping experience. Saris are typically reserved for weddings and married women, and there’s an art to wrapping them—a complicated one—so we decided to go for pants and tunics, or suits, as they call them here. Think of the opposite of stopping into Anthropologie at Lenox…this is personalized attention with a cozy atmosphere. We climbed stairs up into a shop filled with rows and rows of bold fabrics, and were told to sit on mattresses. We had met up with some of our friends’ friends, so we had a large group of girls and a few guys with us. We were all spread out, and the salespeople kept tossing us different patterns. By the end of the experience, we were surrounded by a pile of beautiful cotton fabrics. It was hard to decide which ones to buy, but we both settled on a few favorites, after asking some of the other girls for their opinions!

We then went with them to look for saris for their female family members. We caught a glimpse of what it takes to put one on—it’s no easy feat! There are so many different materials, too—cotton, synthetics, sheers. We haven’t had time to had our fabrics made into “suits” yet, so if you know any great Indian tailors in the U.S., let us know…