"This is tempo, no rickshaw!"

This was also my first week at GVSS! The office consists of three small rooms and a little clinic, all covered in maps of the various slums where they work, posters about sexual health and hygiene, and drawings done by the Women's Self Help groups they facilitate… all of which are written in Hindi, of course (more practice for me)! It's located in a rural desert area outside the city. I was slightly nervous on the first day, unsure of how my first day of work would be at a place where very little to no English is spoken, but it ended up being totally fine. This first week was time for me to get a sense of GVSS’s programs, staff, structure, and daily activities. I spent my first day reading one of their manuals called “Targeted Interventions for Female Sex Workers (FSWs) and other High Risk Groups” so looks like I’m jumping right in!  Although my personal project won’t necessarily be focused on HIV/AIDS interventions and STI awareness for the FSWs they work with, it was helpful to read the manual from which many of their programs are based. Along with the Organization Director and office assistant, there are four outreach workers- (very funny and outgoing) women who go to the colonies and brothels where GVSS programs are focused. Currently, the main programs are an HIV/AIDS testing and health outreach initiative for the sex workers in different colonies and a start-up sewing cooperative. 

I have been successfully taking public transportation to and from work-- an skill that will definitely take some practice. I have the choice between taking a 'tempo,' a kind of carpool/group rickshaw with a set (very bumpy) route into the outskirts of the city or frantically flagging down public bus, an all together hectic experience. Tempos can get VERY crowed in the mornings (to the point of people dangling off all sides) and often times  whiz by me as the drivers think I am making a mistake in hailing them down since they are primarily for people on their work commute. The bus adds 20 minutes to my trip as every few stops, the driver gets off for a chai break while waiting for it to fill up. It gets completely packed and then proceeds to speed down the road nearly plowing through any other traffic. Adjusting to the Indian sense of time has been a slow process.. My famous 'fear of being late to something I am 15 minutes early to’ (thanks, Dad) proved completely pointless as I spent my second morning waiting outside the locked gate of GVSS; a clear indication of my newbie-status to the giggling construction workers next door. Time is more a guideline that anything else.

Aside from spending most of my time reading reports, discussing (thank god for Hinglish) the different programs and slums with the outreach workers, and starting to brainstorm for my project, I was able to so some fieldwork with one of the outreach workers yesterday. We went to an HIV/AIDS testing and counseling center where we joined four of the many sex workers involved in GVSS's HIV/AIDS program. After waiting for each of them to get tested and talk to a counselor (I spent the  waiting time entertaining of two adorable babies they brought along), we distributed iron tablets and a general antibiotic to the Peer Educator, the elected FSW  liaison between the rest of the FSW community and GVSS. Being at the overcrowed, hot, and emotional clinic was definitely an intense first field experience, but an amazing one at that. I can't wait to go into the colonies and have the opportunity to spend more time with the women and to learn more about their lives, families, and ideas for future GVSS programs (as my yet-to be-planned project will eventually be). It has been a week filled with new faces, inspiring work, and much Hindi to learn… oh yes, and 100s of cups of chai and questions about my marital status.