Chai on a Train: How a Simple Beverage in India Changed my Worldview
In 2009, I took my first trans-Pacific flight to India. If fact, it was my first trip outside of the United States and Canada. It was the first of many trips to India, but no experience taught me more about the capacity for love and compassion that all human beings inherently share as that first wonderful exploration into a culture that seemed so different from my own.
Emphasis on seemed. Sure, it looked like an entirely new world to me at the time. India assaults all of your senses…there is horrendous air and noise pollution, and so many people packed into small areas. Doesn’t quite sound like paradise, does it? I had arrived in the capital city of Delhi very late at night, and I was sleep-deprived from not being able to rest on the direct flight from New York. I remember the first thing my driver had told me as we were traveling from the airport to my hotel. “Driving here is like a video game.” A very real video game. When I arrived at my hotel, it was already 2:30 am local time and all I could think about was sleeping, and how it felt like I had jumped into the deep end of a swimming pool without learning how to tread water first. I was tired and nervous. Sleep did not come easily.
I know I must have slept at least a little because it was if I had blinked once and it was 8 am. Even though it was a small, local hotel, room service was available so I ordered toast and chai. That chai! At most hotels in India that cater to the tastes of “westerners”, when someone orders a chai it is often assumed they just mean “tea”, as in plain hot black tea. However, the hotel I chose gave me a beverage that almost literally changed my attitude with one cup. This tea was hot, sweet, and milky, with cinnamon and cardamom. The mystical combination of sweet and spice in that first sip made me PAUSE. That experience was the first defining moment of that trip. This wasn’t from a tea bag or from a coffee store chain! This simple cup of spiced Indian tea reminded me of a phrase I had forgotten: Savor the moment. I spent the next hour eating toast with butter, savoring one little cup of chai, and feeling THANKFUL that I had the opportunity to experience a culture and people that seemed so removed from anything I knew.
There’s that little word again: seemed.
I was able to check out of my hotel and go to the train station to take a four-hour ride North of Delhi to Amritsar. I had a solid half-hour before the train was set to depart, but my frantic mind felt as if I had had mere seconds left to spare. “I have so many things I want- no, NEED to see in India!” I kept telling myself. Of course, not only did I not miss the train, it departed an hour LATE! That was one of many insights into traveling in India: she moves at her own pace, not mine! I boarded my train, where I was lucky enough to have a seat next to the window Nearly every seat was occupied.
There was an incredible diversity in the type of individuals: young children laughing and playing with toys, astute businessmen in suits and ties with briefcases, young men and women dressed in t-shirts and jeans, and older men and women dressed in more traditional Indian clothing. It seemed like an entire cross-section of the Indian demographic was seated in the train car with me. It seemed to me like I was out of place here, and I suddenly felt very alone for some reason…
I was seated next to an elderly woman wearing a red sari. We smiled and nodded to each other as the train began to chug into motion. After fifteen minutes, a man in a crisp white uniform and red turban along with a young woman in a red uniform began to make their way down the aisle, each with their own two-leveled cart. On the top level of each cart were large metal containers; the kind which reminded me of those fifty-cup coffeemakers I would see at family reunions. The bottom level of the carts contained dozens of plastic coffee mugs. “Chai? Chai?” they inquired of each passenger as they made their way down the aisle. Nearly everyone accepted as they filled each cup with the steaming beverage.
CHAI! That mystical beverage I was served at breakfast was being quickly and efficiently dispensed to each passenger “Chai?” the uniformed gentleman asked the elderly woman next to me. She responded to him in Hindi (which I hadn’t even a rudimentary proficiency in), and he poured her not one, but two cups. Upon receiving the second cup, she immediately turned to me and offered me the mug of hot beverage. I smiled, nodded, and accepted the offering. The sweet aroma of the chai! The spicy, steaming beverage! A sudden realization came to me, as I sipped my drink and looked around…we ALL were enjoying this refreshment. ALL OF US on this train, for the next little while, were the SAME people enjoying the same moment…our cup of chai. The pause. Savoring the moment. I began to feel, for the first time on my maiden exploration of this country on the other side of the world from my own, less alone.
What followed were two weeks of the most memorable and in many ways life-changing part of my existence. Many more encounters which changed how I viewed the billions of others with whom I share this planet with. I was really seeing the world as inhabited by people who share so much more in common with each other than their differences. These similarities begin on the most fundamental levels. We share hopes for happiness for ourselves and our loved ones. We share innate desires to know more about the world we live in and wishes for prosperity and love. For me, I was reminded of these wonderful similarities I share with the people of India and all over this Earth, with my first cup of chai.
