In the meantime, I thought I'd rattle off a post about the reason I've been particularly busy this past week, and that's due to my Directed Research project. First a little background: as part of the academic component of the Contemporary India program, every student here is required to complete an internship or a directed research project (or, brand new to this semester, a documentary, but for simplicity's sake we'll focus on the first two). In either case, each student is paired with a company or organization that in one way or another aligns with some part of the short statement of interest we all wrote many months ago when we were applying. For the internship people (about three quarters of the students) their purpose is fairly straight-forward: do whatever work/project/manual labor their organization instructs them to do (just kidding about that last one-I hope). Meanwhile, for the directed research people, the focus is decidedly more scholarly. While we're still paired with an organization that reflects our research interests, we're also given a short research "menu" that lists the two topics that we're allowed to do research on (I didn't ask whether we could craft our own option since both of my topics were quite compelling, but I'm sure there's some flexibility there) . Once a topic is selected, a fairly lengthy (10-12 pages, 1.5 spaced!) Research Proposal is drafted basically setting the foundation of the project with a review of relevant literature, hypothesis formation and methodology planning. After that you do some actual research for five weeks and then tie it all together in an even longer paper (15-18 pages!).
*Side-note: The internship also have to write a paper of some sort but we all know that the directed research people are the real scholars here. Who needs work experience when you have the scientific process??
Now, returning to my project specifically, I noted above how the time when we wrote our statements of interest was long, long ago. As such, I could not for the life of me remember what I had written about other than that I had said something about health and might have mentioned alternative medical practices as a possible area of interest. With that in my mind, I'm sure you have no trouble imagining my surprise when I found out that I would be paired with an organization known as Saheli, a female sex workers' collective. Turns out I had also mentioned STD prevention as a possible area of interest which naturally suggested my desire to work in the red-light district of Pune. All kidding aside though, despite my surprise I was actually really excited to find out about my placement since I knew it would be just another eye-opening cultural experience; not quite like re-learning to eat with my hands or remembering to ride my bike on the left side of the road but in the same ball-park of new experiences provided by India.
Since learning about my topic about two and a half weeks ago, I've already visited Saheli three times and have only positive things to say about my experience thus far. While they're located just off one of the biggest and craziest shopping streets in all of Pune (Laxmi Road), the actual facility is quite non-descript, consisting of two-stories tucked away down a narrow alley. The first floor is actually a 24-hr nursery for the children of the workers, complete with a kitchen, play room and cubby room (and beautifully decorated for the impending Diwali holiday). This nursery provides an invaluable service to many of the women who would otherwise be forced to keep their children in the brothel, or in the case of a less understanding brothel-keeper, let them roam the streets on their own. Up two flights of stairs is the main office, consisting of the director's room (Tejaswi), the accounting room (where Manu and Sarika work) and a general work room (most everyone else, including myself and Karunadeep). None of the rooms are particularly big nor the power particularly reliable, but in my three trips I've yet to encounter someone who wasn't noticeably happy and upbeat the whole time I was there.
Tejaswi (the director) is a women in her early 40s who radiates authority without being (too) intimidating. She's been with the program since the it began as a short-term project of a major NGO in 1991. When the NGO ran out of funding and looked to close up shop around 1997, she and other's at the organization realized that their work with these women could never really be done and so remade themselves into a sex worker's collective, an organization for sex workers and run by sex workers, and thus Saheli (which means female friend in Hindi was born). I talked with her for quite a while on my first visit just going over what we expected out of each other, what she thought about my topic and just general information about the role Saheli plays in these women's lives. I came away thoroughly impressed by the determination to help these women lead independent, healthy life styles and the dedication to work long days and in often difficult circumstances to do so. Manu runs the books at Saheli, keeping track of all the paper work that needs to regularly submitted to their main source of funding, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. She also exudes energy and passion for her work, and was quick to offer me any help she could provide. Sarika is the program manager at Saheli, a role that everyone in the office agreed was by far the most taxing. The program manager is tasked with making sure all the various services provided by Saheli (focus group meetings, free condom distribution, information sessions, the nursery) run without a hitch. Despite this incredible work load, Sarika is always my go-to source for information for my project, never hesitating to take a moment away from whatever's she doing to answer my questions. Karunadeep, usually the only other guy at the office besides me, is the general do-everything worker that every organization needs, doing everything from data-entry to tea-making (a very crucial role when you're talking about India) and of course helping me learn everyone's names. Karunadeep probably has the biggest smile of anyone in the office, and while we can't always communicate verbally because of language barriers, somehow he always manages to understand what I'm trying to say.
I realized I never actually mentioned what topic of research I actually ended up choosing for my project, clearly a fairly important piece of information for those of you still with me. My project will look to understand why many of these women are reluctant to seek STD testing and treatment despite showing symptoms and having positive support institutions like Saheli and government health clinics. Much of this past week was spent researching the answer to this question, and while the women will ultimately provide the final say, a few key factors have emerged. The most prominent based on the literature seems to be a fear of facing stigmatization, discrimination and rejection my peers and loved ones if a test were to come back positive. Particularly in regards to HIV, women are deeply concerned that they'll be completely ostracized both from their families and their line of work if a positive test were to become public knowledge. Sarika also suggested that a lack of knowledge about what happens a positive test has led many women to view a positive test result as a sort of "death sentence," and that they'd just rather not know than live with that sort of fate hanging over them. I'm also hoping to find out whether things like alcoholism, restrictive brothel keeper policies (their bosses not letting them seek testing/treatment) or some other factors might play a role. My research will consist primarily of interviewing the women directly, as well as other members of their social network, like their "partners" (non-paying lovers), peer counselors from Saheli, their brothel keepers and health workers. Hopefully by talking to all these people I'll be able to get a better handle on why these women won't do what's ultimately in the best interest for both them and the community at large.
This post has already become much longer than I envisioned but I hope that the change of pace has been a welcome one to most people. I'll try to add some pictures of the organization when I can but in the meantime look forward to the upcoming travel-related posts and of course the eventual return of "A Turn to the Tummy." I promise I'm just collecting photos of many different types of food (and of course subsequently sampling them), but expect to see the fruits of this labor soon! Once again sorry for the delay, now that we're entering the Internship/DR part of the program some of our classes are ending so blog posts should be occurring with more frequency. But for now its time for my host parent's massive concert at their house (coverage by the Chapters to follow of course) and then off to Madrid to see a Miss Hickey! Namaskar!
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