The book Holy Cow was
written by Sarah Macdonald in 2004. It relates her story and her adventures
throughout India and the different journeys in religion she faced over there.
It’s about new things she found within herself, her love life and even some
internal journeys.
I strongly believed that
Macdonald was a traveler in all of her aspects until I started to read more and
more and realized otherwise. She has a little bit of both mixed in her
personality because she can be traveling but then have characteristics of a
tourist. That’s why I finally decided she was neither a tourist nor a traveler
but a mix of both.
In chapter 11 she says: “…but Passover comes but once a year and I
figure I may never be invited to such an event again. Being able to take up
such opportunities is one of the great privileges of not working-I love not
having plans. In Sydney at our wedding people kept asking me “what do you do
all day in India?” I felt almost embarrassed saying, “traveling”, as it’s not
something valued much in my homeland. But I’m growing increasingly happy with
my choice to go with the flow in life. It’s liberating and exciting.” Page 190.
It definitely shows how she
loves to be a traveler and that feeling excites her. This is something that I noticed because she
constantly expressed characteristics and didn’t care about trying out for new
experiences while she traveled. It’s expressed when in this chapter she goes to
a ritual named Seder that means order and that things must go in order. During
the festival they begin with prayers and also they chant, one of the funny
aspects of this part is that she criticizes that the “wine” was just grape fruit
for those traveling with a backpack (herself). During this ritual she was
trying to see how the Jews were different than the Israeli and compare both of
the religions. I strongly thought that
if I was there I would have done the same.
As I continued to read the
chapter I realized that all of her experiences were just the ones of a
traveler. When she was getting on a plane and it was having turbulence, she was
having difficulties and didn’t know if she should pray, be a Buddhist and
meditate or be a Jew. So she was having a lot of difficulties with
Christianity, Buddhist or the Jew religion. This is what surprised me because
she went and had the experience of a traveler by trying all the religions but
after all she claimed her roots by not knowing if she should pray to Christ. Exactly what a traveler does, he
or she will try a new experience but then he/she will decide to stick to it or
not.
Other comments that made me think she was a traveler
were some like these:
“ I’ve always
wanted to check out a Jewish feast” page 189
“ ..I’ve even
claimed Mount Sinai in Egypt were God came to Moses and told him he must free
his people from slavery. Egypt didn’t let me go without putting the plague on
me and clinical depression on my friend, but when it wouldn’t let the Jews go,
God came to the rescue.” Page 189
Sarah also says “Shanti is Indian for ‘peace’. I find India
anything but shanty-in fact I find it loud, intrusive, brash, impatient and
confronting.” P 186
When I asked things about the people
about India they normally say “they are dirty and don’t shower much” or simply
“I don’t like it”. When I read the comment that she said I thought, “there it
goes”, she has a bit of tourist in herself. By saying that she doesn’t find
India at all peaceful I believe that she is like all of the other tourists, or
in my case friends that think like this. I would’ve thought that she would be
the exception and found India more beautiful and unique in its own way after
she went there but she said this and is a tourist without doubt because
tourists just want the good experience and doesn’t want to see the bad parts
about the country they’re visiting.
“Irit and I define Wonderland differently. To her and her friends, India
is a theme park of cheap thrills and easy drugs away from a country constantly
at war with itself. India has cost me dearly in terms of health and hair and
I’m still a confused Alice-child constantly confronted by creatures beyond my
comprehension.” P 186
After talking to a friend of
her and comparing both of her nationalities she said this comment. Irit is an
Israeli that just got out of her country after serving in the military and she
went to India to find an escape. She told Macdonald “I think India is like
Wonderland to me”. But Macdonald thinks otherwise and that’s why she comments
that way. With this comment I came to the conclusion that she was a tourist
again. How can someone that wants to be a traveler say things like this? She
explains that it cost her things in her health and hair is just a tourist that
wants to explore the good things and left out the bad things that have happened
to her in her life; she just want to explore the country and forget about all
of her bad experiences.
I think I’m a bit like Sarah
after all. Sometimes I just want to be a traveler and other times a tourist.
This happened when I visited the United States and Canada last semester. I
explored it with the mentality of both.
When my family members wanted me to
go to a new place I would ask: “Is it clean? How is it? What will we do
there?” And depending on their answers I
decided if I wanted to go or not. Others I just simply went to the places that
the entire tourist went to, for example the Niagara Falls in Canada. This made
me be the classical tourist all of the residents criticize.
But to my credit sometimes I
didn’t even ask and I just lead them there. When we were in Florida I ask to go
to a mall and just lost myself in the crowds. The Americans looked at me as if
I were a teenager. I tasted the different shakes, compared the prices to Puerto
Rico and even went to the bathrooms over there. I could compare both cultures
my simply visiting a place that was so different from the ones I’m used to.
What I have to say is that I was a traveler here because I was willing to
explore the culture without any judgment in me.
When I compare Sarah and me
I can say that we both are a little bit of a mix. We can explore new things and
be open-minded about it but then have characteristics of a tourist within
ourselves. It’s funny how someone completely different from me can share a
little thing with me. After all being a little bit of both is what’s more
important, “in the variety is the spice of life”.
