On Leave

On my first full day off from work, I ventured down to the beach just outside Auroville to enjoy the beautiful weather.

I also wanted to check out this area, which was heavily damaged by the 2004 tsunami.  Since the disaster, breakers were installed, which you can see in the distance in the photo, which have proved to dramatically erode the beach.

Along the way, I met a group of guys from the Indian Army.

One of the 6 guys is Gagandeep. He is from the Punjab region in Northwest India, and is in an intensive one year training camp to become an officer in the Indian Army.  All the guys are based in the Southern city of Chennai and are on leave for 3 days.

The most striking thing about this group of guys was that they all looked so different. Only Gagandeep, from Punjab, wore a turbin.  The others were all from different regions of India, and grew up speaking completely different languages.  One of the other guys looked more Asian, and revealed his mixed Mongolian and Indian ancestry, a possible result of living in a far Northeast region of India on the border with Burma.  This encounter brought the incredible diversity that is India before my eyes.  An amazing place with many religions, and more than 20 official languages.

The most incredible part of this experience was to see all these guys hanging out together for the weekend on their leave.  Their one year of officer training binds them together, but they will soon be apart.  Upon graduation in March, they will most likely be stationed on the borders of India near Pakistan or China, far from this carefree getaway weekend by the sea in the South.