I Want to Take Them Home with Me!

Today was our last day of work for our first week, and what a week it was. Each of us has been building our own relationships with the community, each other, and the children. I am beginning to understand why "Brangelina" have decided to create their own United Nations family.

Construction was a little slow today because the trucks did not make it to SEAM with the sand, and as a result, the concrete could not be mixed. As the masons requested our assistance, we helped. In between, however, I helped Sanjay and Anis with their reading. I had noticed them flipping through a book and took that as I sign that they wanted a bit of help. Sanjay does not go to school at the moment and Anis was home with a fever. Here, sick kids don't lie in bed while mommy brings tea, medicine, and a back rub. They just hang out - they're orphans and live in a place were three people have the job of watching after 40 kids. And here I thought my grandmother had it hard with 14!

It is hard not to get attached to those we interact with. For instance, Sanjay was adopted as a baby. His parents ended up having a couple of their own children. After a while, they were not able to take care of Sanjay so they dropped him off at SEAM. Since the school year is almost over, he hangs out, but he will start school when the new school year begins, which is in several months. John and Rabeka are there because their father has heart trouble and cannot work. Luckily for them, he pays visits to SEAM. There are other stories, mostly about alcoholism. We almost don't want to ask too many questions for fear our breaking our hearts further.

At lunch, we discussed the option of "adopting" a child or establishing scholarships. This is definitely a dream of the country manager, but one has to be very careful of how the recipient of such a gift is chosen. Imagine 40 kids at SEAM going to a sub-standard public school and one kid gets to go to a really good school. That would not work. Also, if the kids go to a good school, they need a tutor to ensure they are retaining that which they learn in school. (Remember, they don't have parents.) It will happen - we just need a good plan.

Tutoring the nuns is great fun! Yesterday, we played 20 questions, which took a practice round for them to finally understand. I would get questions like, "Are you happy?" and "Where are you from?" Today, we practiced the past tense. Although they understand what it is, they do not know how to apply it as they tend to speak in the present tense. The challenge is that the mistakes they make are made by most Indians who speak English but are not native English speakers. Unless they speak with a native English speaker and/or read the paper, this will be a continuous challenge for them. It is interesting to witness the difference between knowing how to say the words in a foreign language versus being able to get your point across.

Driving in India is interesting. We asked our country manager, Stephen, how a driver knows where to go as we tend not see any street signs. First, the streets do have names but there are two – one in Hindi and the other in British English. Second, on cannot always find a map of how to get to a destination. As a result, one must drive in the general vicinity of his destination and pull over, asking multiple people where to go. But remember that in India, people don't want to say, "No." So when you pull over, the person you ask directions from will point in a direction. To verify they actually knew what they were talking about, you have to pull over multiple times. If more than one person points in the same direction, you know you are going the right way.

During another conversation, Stephen mentioned that he was in New York City for three days in 2007. While we are fascinated by the cows on the streets and in people’s backyards (as pets!), Stephen is fascinated by the dogs with sweaters! Imagine his reaction to this while, in India, dogs tend to be unwanted homeless animals that walk the streets. In contrast, in the US, we take such good care of them that many get to attend doggie daycare.

Tomorrow, we are off on a weekend getaway. One major mission is to buy silks so the local tailor and make clothes for us. Another is to walk the beach in Pondicherry.

A Bit of Culture and a Newfound Respect for Teachers

This morning during yoga, I noticed that the honking horns and crows screaming overhead did not bother me. Then why does the kickboxing class next to my yoga class at the gym bother me? And why is it that everyone honks at each other all day, but no one curses at each other nor do they show the middle finger. They just drive along on their motorcycles or in rickshaws and cars with a non-expressive face. Fascinating!

I would like to think that this is part of the way of the culture here. The rules in this country are so clear that people almost don't even have to discuss roles and responsibilities - they are known. For instance, today at SEAM, Linda's and my role was to help the mason. The defined role of the mason was as follows: put mortar on the brick and place the brick in in its proper position. Our roles were 1) to get the sand so our other helper could mix the concrete; and 2) to line up the bricks so the mason did not have to reach far for them. There were no arguments or hurt feelings, just a grunt when they called on us to do our next task and a game of charades to show us what to do. I wonder - If corporate America applied the defining roles and responsibilities strategy more effectively, would we be more happy and peaceful at work? Or maybe we all need to apply the principle of acceptance. Or both.

While the pollution here is terrible (i.e., I wore a mask on our 45-minute drive to a dance because I am starting to taste the pollution in the back of my throat), we have a thing or two to learn about saving water from the Indians. Showering consists of two buckets - a medium and small one. One could use a shower head but the water pressure is not very good. I am able to take a full-body shower with a half bucket of water. I found the best way to avoid the shock of the cold water is to wipe off with a wet washcloth and then douse my body with the water. It is actually quite refreshing. I am guessing that in the States, we average about 30 buckets of water per shower.

You may wonder why Indian women have such great hair. The nuns told me it is coconut oil! They wash their hair once per week, or twice for a special occasion. Then, they apply the coconut oil - I believe they said everyday. Good-bye frizzy hair!

Before I sign off, I must say that today was a hard day of teaching computers at SEAM. I am now tutoring John and Siva. Knowing that this will be the only week they will get one-on-one computer lessons, I wonder how much they will retain because who knows when the next time will be for them to get such an opportunity. I am noticing that their retention levels are not yet what I had hoped.

Each of us here with Global Volunteers are all facing this. Within one of the schools we go to, students from multiple grades are taught in one room by one teacher! It appears that the kids are split up only when there are volunteers here to help out! Thank goodness there is a team of us here. We debrief 3 times a day and share thoughts, learnings, and hardships so that we can both deal with the challenges and apply new teaching methods that we have brainstormed.

This experience has given me a whole new respect for teachers (and the hardships faced here in this country). So a big THANK YOU goes out to those teachers and mentors who helped me with the wealth of knowledge I have do date. And I finally understand why we did so many drills in class! I am witnessing the impact of not doing them.

So This Is How Parents Feel!

The word for the day is exhaustion. I am beginning to understand what parents mean when they say that they are always tired but love their children and are glad they had them. I truly enjoy the work we are doing here but its level of intensity hit me yesterday when I felt so exhausted that I was nauseous, as did many of my teammates. We debated if this was because of the jet lag (come on, it's been 5 days!), malaria pills (we refuse to read the list of 100 potential side effects), or the hard work. We settled for the latter.

Linda and I were excited about a day without construction. Instead, we went to Assisi, a daycare/orphanage, to join Ginny and Ann. When the car dropped us off, we found 40 kids ages 2 to 5 running over to greet us. OMG! They are so cute. I wanted to take them home with me. As soon as we sat down, they were sitting on us and staring at us with fascination.

One of the teachers did not show up today. This is common in India. Sadly, the State will look at teacher applications and randomly place teachers without considering vicinity of the school to their home. This means that some teachers travel three hours each way. (If they don't take the assigned job, they have to wait one year and reapply so they must take the job.) Since transportation is unreliable, if the teacher misses a connecting bus, she misses school!

Without a teacher, we had to make up a schedule. So we started the day with the ABC song, which is a bit different here. We then sang "Itsy Bitsy Spider" and "The Hokey Pokey." Imagine getting these tiny kids in a circle doing the Hokey Pokey when there barely understand English and are unsure of who the heck these new people are!

The four of us volunteers separated off taking children to learn to write the ABCs. How does someone teach a person who speaks another language the ABCs? You just do! We sang the over and over, I pointed to the board a lot, and helped the kids maneuver their hand so they could correctly write or trace letters. I was as elated as they were when they got something correct. Oddly, when I would ask what the next letter was, they would either stare at me or guess. Instead, we had to re-sing the alphabet song so they could get the next letter...so that's 26 times.

During the afternoon, I went to work with the nuns at St. Joseph's. It is fun to teach conversational English because we get to learn about each others' cultures. Of course, we have to be careful of the topics because they are nuns. I was happy to hear that unlike arranged marriages, being a nun is not an arranged career. Each girl chose this as a career.

This brings me to the background of Indian the dowry. The history behind them is that when a girl gets married, she essentially leaves her family to join her husband's family. To make the transition a bit easier, parents would send her with things from the house. Over time, this evolved into demands by the husband's family. In some cases, a husband's family may be greedy and demand a ridiculous amount of worldly possessions like a house, car, family jewels, etc. It is true that sometimes, the husband's family will kill the wife if the dowry is not good enough. This was devastating to hear.

I am looking forward to my yoga class in an hour. We decided to hire a private instructor who comes here in the morning just before breakfast. I can't remember the name of this type of yoga. It is more about stretching and breathing, which is perfect for what we are doing.

And if you have comments on my blog, feel free to write them. I enjoy hearing from you. Also, some asked if they could forward the link - absolutely! I hope others read this and are inspired to participate in the great work we are doing.

A Lesson in Acceptance and a Small Win

It is 4:30 am in India and I have woken up several times tonight. I now make an oath to eliminate naps, or at least try to. Our days are fulfilling but also filled. Rest is an important thing. Either way, now that I am up, let's try yesterday's blog again.

Before coming to India, Global Volunteers sent us a packet explaining the mission of the organization, which is to serve. I also call it a lesson in acceptance. What this means is that when we go into a community, we are there to partner with the community and serve them in the way(s) they need, working side by side. What this does not mean is instilling the American way unless it is something the community requests and is able to sustain.

An example is the system by which we took bricks to the roof yesterday and the day before. By the way, I used the local way this time (i.e., tie a turban to my head and then put the bricks on top) - much better. I had more brain space to think yesterday since I was more comfortable, calculating approximately 4800 bricks that needed to be taken to the roof, three at a time! I also thought about establishing an assembly line, pulley system, or using a big truck. Option 2 might work as long as it is simplistic, but options 1 and 3 would not. Why? Because the community would not be able to make this a part of the daily system. As a result, it would actually hurt them more than it would help. Our job is to work with them - but in their way. If we have sustainable suggestions, we may be able to incorporate them, but more effectively so when asked to.

My small win of they day came when we returned to SEAM for our daily session with the orphans just before dinner. Katie and I worked with the boys on computers. Since we have three computers now, three boys are able to come into the room at a time. I worked one on one with John, who I categorized yesterday as someone seemingly not interested in learning as he just wanted to play games. I learned otherwise today.

My teammates suggested that John might be bored so I should try advanced tricks on the computer. Since Word and PowerPoint are similar and I don't anticipate him doing any presentations soon (and he knows Word), I decided to try Excel. I worked with him on creating charts and graphs and simple computing. Since his native tongue is Tamil, we had a few funny interactions. For instance, I would ask him to type "Name" as the column title. John asked, "John?" I said, "No, not your name. The word name." By the end, he was just about able to create his own graph. As it was time to go, he said, "Sister, tomorrow, mathematics!" I almost cried. He wanted to learn more!

Another small win of the day was the interaction we had with the locals at the construction site. Today, we worked together and interacted more. For instance, they showed pictures of their family and had us sit with them in a circle while we all broke bricks with hammers. Of course, my immediate thought was, "Where is the chisel?" (Not the local way!)

In the afternoon, we started teaching nuns conversational English. They brought us 7 Up and some sweet thing. The Mother sat with us chatting about the day. Also, the nuns shared with us why their hair is so beautiful - they wash is once, sometimes twice per week and then put coconut oil in it! (Ah! That's why they have gorgeous hair and no frizz in this humidity!)

I like to end each blog with a few cultural tidbits. Today, we learned that men in Southern India wear a moustache and those in the North do not. Also, the Indian food we eat in the States tends to be that of the Northern variety. Southern Indian food is different - for example, no naan (except in hotels). "No naan?!" we all exclaimed. Then we remembered that if there were naan, we would go home quite heavy as we would eat so much of it. The good news is that we are eating bread that is similar. And there is always chai!

I will talk about the history of the dowry tomorrow.

Day 1 - Getting to Work

Admittedly, today was a reality check of the hard work ahead of us. Although there are six of us, we each are paired off to different locations. My roommate, Linda (from Boston), and I are at SEAM (Southeast Asia Mission) for the first half of the program helping with construction. No, we are not painting, laying brick, or spackling walls. That job is for the men. Our job (i.e., the woman's job) is to be a tender, which means we carry everything to the men who do the stuff listed above. Our first task is to carry 4 7-foot piles of bricks up to the roof of the new orphanage. Today, we completed 3 of the 4 piles. You may ask, "Why only 3?" That is because we carry them on our heads. Do the math. Yes, the more you pile on your head at once, the quicker it gets done. Or, as I quickly found out, the less you pile on your head, the longer you last to actually get the work done. I started with 4 bricks, then 3, and ended with 2 per trip.

Mind you, the kids were off today and could not wait to help us! Some of these tiny, adorable kids were carrying 4! Get this. The local woman who partnered with us (we always have those in the community helping us as we are there to help them as opposed to them being there to help us as this is what builds a true community) could carry 8 (yes, 8) bricks on her head. She did not even have to hold them! She simply balanced them as she gracefully (odd word, I know) walked up a flight of stairs.

Knowing we have intense labor ahead, I am keeping myself motivated knowing that instead of having 40 orphans sleeping on cement floors in one large room, they are about to have a home with 3 bunk beds per room. Once the dorm is built, our host will work on getting flowers in the yard. The dorm will be complete in early March.

I am impressed with how creative the kids are. Yesterday, we gave them Blow Pops. One boy found a water bottle and used the Blow Pop cap as its cap. He would stomp on the water bottle and the cap would fly across the yard. This entertained him all day.

Just before dinner, we taught small groups of boys how to use the computer. Some wanted to draw, others wanted to explore cutting and pasting shapes while coloring them in creative ways, and then some wanted to spell sentences in English. They would be overjoyed when they figured out how to do something new. Given that there is no lesson plan, the hardest was to figure out who knew what. Our sponsor is going to have us start documenting what we do so they will have a learning continuum.

The role of women vs. men in the Indian society is something to get used to. But there are other very cool traditions. Note that I am on sensory overload so I can only remember the latest story that I am told. I asked our host why women tend to wear gold and silver, where the gold tends to be above the waist and silver below it. From this question, I learned the following. Indian tradition is such that married people do not wear wedding bands, but the women do wear jewelry - and lots of it. Upon marriage, they are given an pendant called a Thali, which is tied around there neck with a string tied in three knots (thus the saying, "tying the knot"). Some women replace the string as it wears while others simply buy a gold chain to hold the Thali. Since it is inappropriate for women to wear low-cut shirts, men cannot look down their necks to see if they are wearing a Thali. Instead, they also wear silver toe rings. Only married women are to wear these, allowing men to look at their feet (instead of down their shirts) to determine whether they are single or married.

Hopefully, I can get to sleep tonight. Either the hard work or malaria pills (or both) are tiring me out so much that I take long naps, but then I am wide awake at night.

India for the first time

I always enjoy traveling to a new country. It is like being a child all over again, seeing the world in a whole new way, smiling so widely that some may think I actually look strange. This journey, however, is quite special as I am both traveling to a new country, India, and volunteering.

I arrived to Mumbai on Friday night at about 9 PM. Admittedly, I was a bit scared on the plane. It finally hit me that I was going to a country that was so different from anything I had experienced before. Would I like it? Would I hate it? Would I be safe? Would volunteering be all that it was cracked up to be? Given all the warnings from the travel books, it was no wonder I had such mixed feelings.

When I landed, my feelings changed instantly. I quickly found that the Indian people are so kind, patient, and hospitable - something I, as an American, can learn much from. Within the first hour, I had two Indian men explain to me why the domestic airport was different from but the same as the international airport, direct me to the pre-paid taxi section, pay for my cab, and make sure I got to my cab and hotel safely. One even gave me his business card in case I ran into trouble.

Once I arrived to the hotel, I soon realized I booked myself to the wrong hotel, meaning I booked for my final destination city instead of my connecting city...with points...and it was past the timeframe within which I could cancel without a fee. After begging and smiling, the hotel in Mumbai called Chennai, asking them not to charge me and I was able to get a room at the correct hotel. I even got roses and an upgrade. (Why do these things happen when I go to a hotel only to sleep rather than to hang out AND sleep?) When I got upstairs, I decided I could not be crammed in my room overnight without doing "something" in Mumbai. So I hit the hotel bar to write in my journal and found two Americans traveling on business. We chatted until 1:30 AM and they bought me a couple of beers and shared their snacks.

The next morning, I headed off to the airport for my final destination. There were not nearly as many greeters at the domestic airport as there were at the international airport. I later find that entire families gather at airports waiting for their loved ones to return from abroad. There are hundreds of signs being held up so you just pray the person picking you up knows to look for you as well as you knowing who to look for!

And now, I am at the guesthouse of Global Volunteers in Porur, just outside Chennai. There are six female volunteers, mostly from the US and one from Taiwan. Everyone is lovely, including our host, Stephen, his wife and son, the cook, and the watchman.

Today, we had our team meeting to discuss the three weeks. I will be doing construction at an orphanage for half the time and playing with the orphans the other half. Thanks to my friend, Debbie, who donated THREE laptops, these kids are going to have an opportunity to learn computer skills.

Just prior to dinner, we met the orphans. I almost cried. As soon as we opened the gate, the kids were all running to us. Each shook our hand, looked us in the eye, and said anything from "Welcome. How are you?" to "What is your name? My name is...." (Each child greeted each volunteer this way and there were about 40 kids.) And they all wanted their photos taken so they could see what it looked like on the LCD screen. They were unbelievably polite and kind. They all sat down, boys on one side and girls on the other, singing us a song. Then one boy stood up and sang a solo. I looked in amazement at these children who looked at us with so much love and appreciation. I wondered if American children are really like this at this age. These kids sit on a dirt floor, maybe have one outfit, and get a minimal public school education. Yet they are so gentle, sweet, AND energetic!

Some warned me that I will either hate or love India. Sure it is dirty and poverty-striken. Yes, there are cows roaming all over and I can barely breath due to all the exhaust. But by simply walking the streets, smiling and interacting with the locals, I can't help but be elated and grateful for this opportunity.