The ABCs of our India Trip - Part 2
>> Tuesday, January 17, 2012
E is for eating with our hands. I don’t know how I missed reading about this is the information we got about India before we went but everyone eats with their hands. Well, I should say “hand” because you only eat with your right hand. The left hand is considered dirty since they don’t use toilet paper and clean themselves with just water and their left hand. I was shocked when we walked in the room and there were 35 people eating with their hands. The kids thought this was the best thing ever. Ironically, there is a specific way to do it which took some getting used to. The first day they put a few pieces of silverware on our table but we just felt too strange being the only ones using them. Just like they would feel weird being the only ones eating with their hands in a restaurant in the US. All of the parents feed the kids under 5 or so – and after the first few days of Sora feeding herself I realized why – 2 year olds eating rice with their hands make a HUGE mess. So for the rest of the meals I ended up feeding Sora.
F is for Flies. Lot of them. We were told there is a chicken farm close by where we were staying which made the flies a problem. The problem is that with all of us going in and out a lot during the day there was no way to keep them out. Damien ended up becoming a fly-killing machine and would easily go around and kill 15 in a matter of minute. But, by the second week we realized the war was not to be won by us so we surrendered to the flies.
F is also for Fever. Which I had for 24 hours but never figured out why. Strange.
G is for God. He is at work in the hearts of his followers in the country. Less than 3% of the 1.1 billion people are Christians. The center we were on was mainly a training center for people becoming missionaries. We lucked out to come during their last week of their one year training and got to watch their graduation and commissioning. It was so humbling to see these people who will go to remote parts of their country – where the language is completely different from their own –where there is no church and not one Christian – where they could possibly face persecution – where their family is a 3 days journey away. To live in houses that we couldn’t dream of living in. We were so blessed to get to know some of them and be a part of their special time.
Laying hands on the graduates during the commissioning service.
They all sang a song which was really nice.
H is for Hand-Washing Laundry. I’m not sure if washing machines are too expensive or if electricity is too expensive or if the fact that you only have electricity for a portion of the day, but everyone hand washes their clothes. Thankfully they gave us a few helpers to do ours – wow, it’s a full time job. I never would have had time to help with the workshop if I had to wash all our clothing. It was so interesting to watch how they did it. But man, it sure is rough on your clothes. My biggest problem with it is that they kept having it on this line between two trees that had the HUGE red ants walking across it. So when I took the laundry down I’d have to get them off of each item and man they bite and it hurts. They also hung it right where they burned our trash - so we smelled like a campfire for 2 weeks.
I is for Internet – which we didn’t have. I have to say this was probably the hardest part of the two weeks. I don’t understand why we are so tied to the Internet? We didn’t even have it 10 years ago. But it was a good lesson in just being still and not having to always be doing something. We played a lot of UNO - it's the kids new favorite game!
J is for Just be content. I am so glad we were able to go on this trip. This workshop was important and they really needed FieldWorks experts. But there were definitely aspects that were difficult. The living situation was hard. We were in a house that had 3 rooms but we shared it with other people. We were all in the same bedroom. I need my privacy – if anything just to be able yell at my kids sometimes. J Having to keep them quiet because the other people were there was hard. It was a good lesson on being content for the kids too. Eating the same type food for breakfast, lunch and dinner was NOT easy for them. There was a lot of complaining. But they did get better and I hope they learned a lesson from it. There were times I wanted to complain (internally) but then I’d be so humbled by the fact that we were just dealing with this for 18 days – the nationals who we were working with live like this constantly. Even living in Thailand we have it easy.
K is for Kenny G. – When Micaiah said he knew that we were in India because they were playing Indian music, it was Kenny G that was playing.
L is for Loud. The traffic here is a bit C-R-A-Z-Y. Horns are in constant use by everyone. At one point we were stuck in traffic (it took about 30 minutes to go 1/2 Kilometer) and Sora
M is for Motorbikes. Another thing I was surprised with. In both the city and the villages there were tons – I’d say at least 5 to 1 in the city and more in the villages.
M is also for Mustaches. Orin said they make people look like they are about to do something bad. Crazy kid. Funny thing is that by the end he didn't feel that way anymore. He was used to it.
N is for New Friends. Being the only westerners on the center of course we stood out. As in Thailand, they kids were always being talked to and played with. We all made some new friends.
...and some friends who we weren't very sure of...and who weren't sure of us either. :)
N is also for New Year. We were there over New Years Eve. The center had a service which they called the “watch night service” which went from 9pm until 1am. People gave testimonies and sang. They asked Orin and Micaiah to come do a song which thankfully they were happy to do. They sang “My God is so big” and then Micaiah sang a Thai song by himself. Lots of people taking pictures of course. I don’t know what they are going to do when we go back to the US and no one pays attention to them. I can’t tell if they were be relieved or feel like no one likes them. Damien left with the kids (who were falling asleep in their chairs) around 10:30pm and I stayed. We lit candles as it turned midnight and sang songs in English and Hindi. I figured I probably wouldn’t get a chance to ring in the New Year in this way ever again so Damien put the kids to bed and let me stay.
Some ladies doing a special song. Actually, everyone in India seems to be able to sing. People came up and gave short testimonies and every one of them sang a song.
Lighting candles as we rang in the 2012!
