My key scenes Gandhi – The Movie

1. the assasination

2. the train scene

3. first speech/meeting with Indians in SA

4. first fasting

5. the massacre by the British

6. the salt march

7. riots between Hindus and Muslims -> Gandhi’s fasting

Gandhi – The Movie

When Gandhi finally meets up with his colleagues he finds out what the actual social conditions are in South Africa, yet up until then, he was ignorant of these. What does this say of communications in this time period?

What is Gandhi’s decision regarding the social conditions in South Africa?

When Gandhi travels to South Africa, he finds out that the black people living there are discriminated. For example they aren’t allowed to walk on the sidewalk but on the street. The Whites think they are better people and the Blacks pollute “their” sidewalks and cities.

In one situation Gandhi is discriminated himself. When he’s on the train in South Africa, he has to leave the first class because of his heritage and his facial color. Due to these experiences Gandhi makes his decision to fight the discrimination by non-violent resistance.

Gandhi meets Charlie Andrews, the English clergyman, and they walk downtown together. What book does Gandhi quote from? Do you think that this is unusual for a Hindu?

I’m not quite sure about the book that Gandhi quotes from but I think it was the Bible. If that’s correct it shows us that Gandhi was a very open-minded man who also know about other religions than his own one. by knowing the Bible he is able to understand the Christians a lot better than the Christians understand the Hindus. But I don’t think that many Hindus know the Bible and can quote from it.

At the end of this meeting, the audience stands. What is the meaning of this? What is the irony of the Englishmen standing?

All the people in the hall stand at the end of Gandhi’s speech because they want to show him that they are on his side. They will follow him and they believe in his views. When all the people stand there are only the Englishmen standing, because they don’t support Gandhi. But then the audience starts singing the English national anthem and it makes the still sitting Englishmen stand up. Because otherwise they wouldn’t show the correct respect to their King although they are forced to stand up to show that they support Gandhi and not to show respect to their King.

Charlie Andrews gives a Sunday sermon which supports Gandhi. What happens?

When Charlie Andrews starts talking about Gandhi and that he can understand Gandhi’s wills and aims, there are many believers who simply stand up and leave the church because they don’t agree with the clergyman’s opinion. But there are also some people who remain in the church and nod their heads when Andrews talks about different aspects.

Gandhi leaves SA for Bombay in 1915 [...]. When he reaches Bombay he is greeted by a mass of Indians. Describe the Scene where Gandhi is asked to say a few words.

When Gandhi enters the small stage that was built up only for his speech he doesn’t know what to say to the audience. He looks a bit shy when he sees all the people who came to see and to hear him speak. Because of his confusedness he can only say a few words about his time in India and the goals he achieved. I also think that Gandhi hasn’t realized until that point how important he became for the Indians by fighting for their freedom in South Africa.

What is the “salt march” and why is it significant? What is Gandhi’s philosophy of civil resistance? How is this philosophy further exhibited by the Indian demonstration at the salt works?

At the salt march Gandhi starts to walk to the Indian Ocean. He is accompanied by many Indians and on his way the group grows more and more. When they reach the Ocean, they scoop salt out of the sea. This is forbidden for Indians, because England has a monopoly on the production of salt.

By scooping salt, Gandhi and his fellows want to demonstrate against the British who took away the right of producing salt what the Indians did for many hundred years before.

Later in the movie/Gandhi’s life, there is a demonstration in front a salt production. There are many of Gandhi’s followers who are ready to suffer from pain by the British. They march in lines to the gate of the production, where they are beat by British soldiers. But although the Indians can see what happens to their people, they don’t stop marching to the gate so they get all beat by the British.

What is Gandhi’s solution to try to unite the Hindu and Muslim of India and does it work?

When there are big riots going on between Hindus and Muslims, Gandhi starts fasting to stop them. It takes some days until the leaders of Hindus and Muslims pledge to stop fighting against each other and by then Gandhi is already in a very bad condition so that they saved his life. This shows that Gandhi is really serious in his views and would die for a untied India with Muslims and Hindus living peacefully together.

At first Gandhi’s concept worked out and he stopped the riots but then they started again.

Attitude to abortion in India

On July 31st the narrator gets to know that she is pregnant. Maji, who has once been a midwife, tells her that she can see it.

When the two women talk about being pregnant, Maji asks the narrator whether she needs some help in this situation. By this she doesn’t only want to help her mentally but also physically – she asks her if she wants to abort the baby.

According to Maji there are many abortions in India due to the fact that this is very often the only way how the women can be saved from “dishonour and suffering” (p. 129, l. 9). Because Maji talks so open minded about abortions it seems to me that it is a common thing in India, not just for her as a midwife, but for everybody. As she said before there is often no other choice for pregnant women. They have to suffer from the pregnancy due to the bad infrastructure and the bad state of their medical scheme. Probably the women would also suffer from the people’s gossip. I think it is very rarely that Indian women get a baby although they aren’t married. What makes the situation even worse for Inder Lal and the narrator is that he is still married and already has children with his wife. I think there could be many people who point at them in the streets, saying “Look, this is the British woman who has stolen Ritu’s husband and now she is pregnant from him.”

In this aspect we can see a difference between European and Indian society. On one hand Indians don’t accept misbegotten children, Europeans on the other hand do accept them and their parents.

The narrator, however, doesn’t really think about her own situation when Maji tells her about abortions. She is only interested in the stories because they are exciting to her. I think she didn’t realise so far that she is pregnant from an Indian and so she doesn’t think about the consequences.

Plotting the story (pp.103-116)

On pages 103-109 the first person narrator finds a dying beggar woman named Leelavati at a garbage heap. She is the only person who notices her. All the Indians around just don’t care about the woman.

She lies there on her own and nobody helps her. But when she is found by the first person narrator she finally receives help. The first person narrator wants to do something but everyone she asks doesn’t want to touch the beggar woman. They all seem to be scared of the pollution of a dying person. Inder Lal is also afraid of her and he wants to keep the narrator away from touching her. In this situation she can feel the fear of pollution, too. This shows the change in her mind. She and her behavior is becoming more and more like the Indians.

Because she cannot find anybody who wants to help her she has to look for some other help. Therefore she goes to the hospital to ask for it. But this seems to be completely overfilled with people. Even the Medical Superintendent seems to be swamped with his situation. He needs more staff and more room for the invalids but he won’t get it because of India’s poverty.

So it sounds as if she is the only one who wants to help Leelavati. But when the narrator leaves the hospital, she finds Maji and talk to her about the dying beggar woman. She knows her and so she wants to help.

In this scene you can see a difference between the Europeans’ and the Indians’ behavior. The Indians don’t want to help the dying beggar woman, although she really needs it. They are afraid of touching a sick person and the just don’t care about others. Maybe they act like that because the people in India are very poor. First of all they have to take care of themselves and of their own problems. They have no time for others and they haven’t got money to do so.

The European, however, wants to help the dying person. She cannot face the fact that there is nobody else who wants to take care of Leelavati so she looks for help but cannot find it. She feels responsible for the beggar. I think the reason for this is the different European mentality from the Indian’s. Also our religion tells us that everybody is equal and that we have to help others who cannot take of themselves or who need help.

broken PC…

Because my PC broke down at the weekend I don’t know if I’ll be able to do the upcoming tasks, just as an excuse

See you in the real life!

Stefan

Olivia’s daily routine

Because Olivia stayed at home instead of leaving for Simla with the other women for the hot summer months she is the only woman left.

Her days begin pretty early in the mornings. After Douglas has left the house, Harry picks her up and they drive to the Nawab’s palace in Khatm. There she spends the day with all the other guest; they are all men. They lie around in the drawing room, drinking, smoking and playing card games. One day the Nawab shows Olivia the piano he ordered for his wife that she never played on. He wants Olivia to play for him on this piano.

Olivia spends the whole day at the Nawab’s and in the evenings she returns to her home. There she waits for Douglas and together they spend the evening and the night together, thinking about having babies. Sometimes they have a small meeting at their house with Mr. Crawford and Major Minnies whose wives are in Simla. Together they have dinner and talk about the Indians and the country.

Effect of dust storms on people

I imagine that dust storms can have a very bad effect on the people who live in a region with several dust storms per day.

The worst fact, in my opinion, is that you cannot go outside due to the storms. If you would leave your house you could hardly breathe, walk or see anything. So the people have to stay inside their houses as long as the storm takes. Maybe for just an hour but maybe also for the whole day. These people can get very sick like Olivia in the story. She has to stay inside and doesn’t know what to do besides playing the piano.

When the people are inside their houses they have to close the windows because otherwise the houses would be full of sand and dust. So they don’t just have to stay inside they also cannot see the sun, sometimes even for a whole day.

Description of Inder Lal’s wife

Inder Lal’s wife, Ritu, seems to be a very shy person. You can see that when the narrator visitis Inder Lal’s flat. Then [Name] never talks to the British narrator, though she knows some Hindu. She doesn’t just ignore her, she even flees from her.

One day when the narrator visits Inder Lal and his family she goes into the bathroom and stays in there for the whole visit.

Maybe she acts like that not because she’s shy but because she’s afraid of the British. They came to “her” country and ruled it for many years – also with violence. Thus she got a bad impression by the British although she never really talked to one of them.

Perhaps Ritu is jealous of the narrator. Inder Lal and the narrator spend a lot of time since her arrival in India together. He shows all the interesting places to her and they always have a good time together. When Inder Lal talks to his wife in the evenings and tells her about his experiences over the day with the British girl his wife could think Inder Lal feels attracted to this European.

Another aspect of Ritu is that she doesn’t seem to have a high education. When the British narrator talks to Inder Lal’s mother she tells her that she didn’t want a high educated wife for her son. She bases this statement because in her opinion, educated wives are difficult to deal with. They have their own mind so they don’t simply accept the things they are told by their husbands and mothers-in-law.

stuff

In the spring it is getting very hot in India. Due to this fact all the Indians pull their beds outside at night so they don’t have to sleep in their hot houses. The narrator even says “The town has become a communal dormitory” (p. 52, l. 29-p. 53, l. 1).

At first she doesn’t want to sleep outside like all the Indians do because she was “embarrassed to go to bed in public” (p. 53, ll. 3-4). But because it’s too hot for her inside she pulls her bed into the courtyard and sleeps there.

She is very happy about sleeping there. She says she even lies awake for hours with happiness (l. 15). Then she listens to all the sounds in the surrounding area – but no to the Indians; they are totally quiet when they sleep (l. 10). She enjoys this quietness because over the day it’s very loud in the streets and very disruptive.

But she doesn’t just listen her surroundings. She watches the sky and thinks about being a part of the space.

Another aspect why she enjoys sleeping outside is that it makes her feel like she’s one of the Indians because they all do the same at that special moment – sleeping outside.

In this part of the story the narrator sounds completely happy about being in India and sleeping under the open sky. It’s probably a very new thing to her because she might have never done that in England before. That’s why she’s embarrassed at the beginning. But then she sees that it’s very useful and enjoyable. It gives her a new impression  of India.

In my opinion it’s very cool when you sleep outside under the open sky. You get a new impression of the environment when you listen to all the animals. And it offers the narrator to become a part of India by doing something that they all do.

short biography of unkempt European

Hello,

my name is Michael Schulz. Now I’m 25 years old and I came to India 4 years ago. As you can see my name sounds very German. In fact I come from Hagen in Germany.

When I was three years old my parents got divorced. Because they were both alcoholics I was sent to a children’s home. The same happened to my older brother. But because he was already 16 years old back then he came to another home. The day I had to leave my home was the last time I saw my parents…

So I was all on my own from that day on. I was very bad at school and had a bad behaviour. Nobody knew how to get on with me so I was sent to another children’s home after one year. At that time I was already 17 years old and I fled from my new home. I didn’t know where to stay because my only friends were still in that home. So I had to live in the streets.

In the beginning I did nothing but sleeping in the parks of my home town and getting some food.I grabed the food out of the garbage cans that nobody wanted to eat anymore. But there was no other choice – I had to eat to survive. Furtunately I fled during the summer. Otherwise I had died outside.

After two weeks without normal food and without taking a bath or a shower I made a decision. I didn’t want to live on like that.

In one of the garbage cans -at that time I called them fridges- I found a newspaper with some job advertisments. I needed a job where you don’t beed any qualifications because I had no school certificate. I found an advertisment of the local garbage collection. They hired me and I finally had a job and money. I even found a small flat.

At that time the Beatles were very succesful in Germany and they had a big influence on me. I liked their music and the way they lived. That’s how I got involved with India. One day I heard on the radio that George Harrison went there for his spiritual quest. The country sounded very interesting and it put a spell on me although I had never been there before. From then on I saved all my money for my trip to India. It took me 2.5 years to earn enough money. It was a hard time for me but I kept dreaming my dream. My dream of India.

When I came here I had enough money to live for a couple of years. That happened four years ago…

At the beginning I travelled through the whole country and I could feel the spirit of India. The spirit that the Beatles were always talking and singing about. And that was when I got in touch with drugs. I got the from one of my fellow passengers, Mike from the USA. He had the same aim like me. But he had drugs with him…

I smoked some joints at the beginning and then it became worse and worse. I couldn’t get on with my life in India any longer. The drugs became a part of the spirit of India but I couldn’t feel that spirit anymore.

I spent all my money for the drugs. So I couldn’t go home to Germany. Nobody there knows where I am. But nobody is interested in me.

And now I’m living in streets of Bombay. Almost the same way I lived in Germany. But now I’m searching for drugs and food. Yes, I am addicted to drugs… I cannot get away from them… That’s why I’m living the way I live…