Heading home

I start my return home tonight with a flight from Mumbai to Zurich, then Zurich to LA. I should be home Wednesday afternoon. In many ways, these 3 weeks have FLOWN by, as vacation always does. Just as I’ve become accustomed to the time difference, the cultural adjustments and my place in the rhythms of this life, it is time to go home. These three weeks have been a great reminder of why I do what I do, a rejuvenation of my call to love the children of rural India. Being immersed in their lives, even for a short period of time, reminds me of my purpose, my responsibility and my privilege. I am so fortunate to have the opportunity to travel, to raise awareness about the poverty in this area, and the lack of opportunity for deserving and wonderful children, who just need a little help.

As I conclude my time here, I wanted to name some of the things I’ll miss, some of my favorite things about visiting, some of the things I look forward to when I return next year. The first is the hospitality of tea: Masala chai is amazing (black tea with milk and sugar, cardamom, ginger, etc) but the practice of offering tea to visitors is what I’ll miss. Each time I visit someone, tea is served. (or coffee, depending on the company) What a gift to be offered something just for visiting.

Another thing that has been great this visit, is to see how my friends’ twins have grown. I love being Aunt Krista and it was fun to connect with the boys this year, as they are now a year and a few months.

There is something exciting about being in a place where you can visibly see the progress! At Panchsheel Ashram School and Felix Convent School, there is construction happening, new wings of buildings sprouting up, dirt roads being paved, new classrooms welcoming students to school. The progress is visible and that is exciting.

One of the new projects that is coming (and I will share details later) is an effort to provide beds for each of the 620 students of Panchsheel. For years, the children have been sleeping on mats, a custom of the region. But due to some recent snake visits, the need for beds, to move the children from the floor, is more urgent. Progress shows up in many ways.

But most of all, I will miss the people: my friends, the teachers and students. They are a blessing in my life. Until next year, फिर मिलेंगे - we will meet again.

New Sewing Machines and New Opportunities

After the completion of the tailoring program, ten young women were gifted a brand new sewing machines! Each student has learned to make patterns, cut and sew pieces together and now have an opportunity to make a living as a seamstress, a tailor or to help their families. Congratulations to those 10 young women and best wishes for a wonderful future.

Supporting Education One Girl at a Time

What a joy! These past few days I have been busy locating the students we’ve supported in the past and finding new students to add to our lists, photographing them and getting to know them a little so that I can share with our donors. Our student sponsorship program is the foundational program of our organization and it will be undergoing a transformation this year to address the needs of our schools in a more effective way. We began the program long before we became an official organization, supporting 30 students each year. This year we are supporting 50 students, 30 from Panchsheel Ashram School and 20 from Felix Convent School. Since 2015, we’ve sponsored 667 girls in primary and secondary school and supported 3 young women through Nursing School. (2 of which visited Panchsheel School when I arrived! They are now nurses in Paratwara.)

This year we are establishing a “Girls’ Education Fund” for each school: the Felix Convent School Girls’ Education Fund and The Panchsheel Ashram School Girls’ Education Fund. Our donors will still donate $100 per student and, in return, will receive the name and photograph of a deserving student. Those donations will be pooled into a fund used to support girls education in the many ways needed. Those needs may include infrastructure, equipment, and/or supplies. This is still developing, so please stay tuned!

Welcoming Water

Yesterday, I had the privilege of inaugurating two new water purifier/coolers at Panchsheel Ashram School. These new water coolers will provide clean and safe water to the 600+ students.

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Scenes from the boat

On the last day of our Kerala mini-vacation, we journeyed to Kumarakom to take a 4 hours boat trip on Vembanad Lake, which is connected to the Arabian Sea. We rented the whole houseboat, so we had 3 staff and 3 of us on this big boat, with a private bedroom, dining room and an upstairs viewing area/lounge (where I spent much of the time.) We also had a full Indian lunch and time for a a nap!

Being on the boat, feeling the wind move, watching the world inch forward, listening only to birds and waves and distant noise of life beyond the water…. it really was such a blessing to me. I kept thinking to myself, “I am so blessed to have the opportunity to be here, right now.” What a gift. It was peaceful and soothing in a way I didn’t know I needed. A reminder to be aware of the NOW and to be grateful for all I have in this NOW.

I did my best to photograph the birds I saw and I think they are:

The Brahminy Kite, also known as the red-backed sea-eagle, is a medium-sized bird of prey in the family Accipitridae, which also includes many other diurnal raptors, such as eagles, buzzards, and harriers, found in the Indian subcontinent, Southeast Asia, and Australia.

The Little Cormorant is a member of the cormorant family of seabirds. Slightly smaller than the Indian cormorant it lacks a peaked head and has a shorter beak. It is widely distributed across the Indian subcontinent and extends east to Java, where it is sometimes called the Javanese cormorant.

The Bronze-winged Jacana , a striking resident bird with a dark glossy body, a contrasting white supercilium (eyebrow stripe), and vibrant greenish-bronze wings, often spotted foraging on aquatic plants.

Visiting the Spice Garden

Yesterday we left Munnar area and drove to Thekkady and along the way we stopped at a Spice Garden. We had seen one a few days ago, but that was just focused on ayurvedic medicinal plants, which is fine, but I am more interested in cooking spices. :)

Most of the photos I took were of ornamental flowers, but I did get some occasional spices, too. We saw Vanilla, cinnamon and nutmeg too, but they were not too photogenic… they make up for that with the amazing scents and flavors! And I learned Indian bay leaves (tejpatta) come from a tree closely related to cinnamon, and whose bark is often used as cinnamon. Standard western bay leaves come from the Mediterranean bay laurel tree (Laurus nobilis), which is entirely separate from cinnamon trees (Cinnamomum).

Peppercorns

Green Cardamom pods

Black Cardamom pods just beginning to grow

Coffee beans

Top of the World

Yesterday was a full day of touristing! We drove up to Eravikulam National Park , a 97-sq-km wildlife sanctuary located 13 km from Munnar, Kerala. I found this handy graphic to understand where I am and where I’ve been. On Friday, as we were arriving we stopped at (5) Attukau Waterfalls. On Saturday we went to the Kannan Devan Tea Museum (6) and drove up to the National Park.

You may ask, what kind of wildlife did you see? Well, besides cows on the road, monkeys bothering people, stray dogs… none. Because we took a bus trip up the mountain and they dropped us off at the visitor’s center. If we wanted to enter the sanctuary part, we had to walk uphill for a kilometer to reach the wildlife area. Both Sheela and I said no.

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We toured the tea museum, which was interesting and saw the machines at work. Fascinating to see tea being made, and the guides were very informative about how to identify the teas and the buds, etc. Today, we head out to Thekkady for the night, then we make our way home, back to Agape Guest House, then flights to Bangalore, Nagpur then the drive home.

Journeys and destinations

I am in Kerala, perched atop the world, listening to birdsong and children play, as I write this post from the balcony of my wonderful hotel.

On Wednesday, we began an adventure to Kerala. I had never been to South India, so my friends Bajirao and Sheela decided to take me; that it was a part of India I needed to see. So, in the middle of my work-vacation, we are on an escape-vacation. There is something freeing about having someone else plan your trip - I have no control over the plans, but I trust my friends (our friendship is now 18 years old!) to steer me right.

We started by driving to Nagpur and staying overnight to be ready for our morning flights. We then flew all day on Thursday - from Nagpur to Bangalore then on to Cochin.

Saying Goodbye to out hosts at the Agape Guest House, until we return.

We were picked up by a driver and friend of the Gawais at the airport and taken to the Agape Center to stay overnight in the guest house and then on Friday, we made the trip to Munnar, where we are staying. On the way to Munnar, we stopped at a waterfall (where the monkeys were terrorizing the visitors) and found a shop that sold me spices, coffee and chocolates!

We left on Wednesday and it took almost 3 days to get here, We’ll stay for 2 days and then begin the journey home. All this journeying to a place we’ll stay for 2 days had me thinking: Maybe life IS all about the journey and not about the destination. Wouldn’t it be great to pick a destination I could get to on the first day of travel?!? Imagine flying somewhere and then just BEING there?!?

When you are a pastor on a limited vacation schedule ( 4 weeks a year minimum -but I have been blessed with churches that use that as a guideline, willing to extend it as needed), 3 weeks in India seems like a long time. But most of the days are spent trying to get to places I want to be. I just counted…. 12 days of my 3-week vacation are spent traveling!

Thankfully, I love the journeying part: I love the time spent observing people in their own culture, thinking about how diversity is a gift, about how fortunate I am to be in a position to be able to do what I do, taking in the sights and sounds and smells of a new environment… Having extended time to sleep, think, reflect and store up all the beauty in my memory bank so that it will sustain me for another year, until I return to fill up my senses once again.

Touring Panchsheel

Panchsheel School is a residential school with 620 students enrolled. This year, the amount of girls surpassed the number of boys . The school is supported by government funding, and there are no fees for families. The academic standards are high, the extra curricular activities are varied.

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We support the school’s efforts to offer children opportunities, to provide essential materials and uniforms, to help improvement projects on the campus. It is an exciting place- lots of good things happening!

Celebrations at Felix

The morning assembly at Felix Convent School was a grand celebration. Along with the usual celebrations of birthdays, the news of the day, reminders for the students to listen and learn well, the singing of the Indian National Anthem and the state song of Maharashtra, we inaugurated three brand new classrooms. Each classroom was furnished with desks and benches provided through our Friends of Padhar Schools fundraising. What a joy to see the fruit of our efforts!

Felix Convent School is a private school located in Paratwada that serves children from Nursery to 12th class. The school has undergone tremendous growth as evidenced by enrollment of 1100+ (and increase of 300+ this year) and the construction projects that continue to expand the campus and its ability to host the student population. The school employs 39 teachers in all areas of expertise and has recently transitioned to a digital teaching platform.

Each classroom is equipped with smart TV that can be utilized for lessons and examples. While I was in the 3rd grade class, they were learning about the different types of clothing worn in the regional areas of India. It was fascinating! The teachers also utilize an App that allows them to upload lessons, homework, assignments, and families can access them via smartphones. I was surprised to learn that the platform has a 98% usage rate by the families!

The projects contnue! There are 5 more classrooms to be built, hopefully to be finished by my trip next year. They are also adding solar panels to deal with the electricity needed.

Kho Kho with the girls

Yesterday, I watched the girls play Kho Kho. I learned this from Google: Kho kho is a traditional and fast-paced tag sport from ancient India. Played on a rectangular court with two wooden poles at either end, two teams take turns chasing and defending. The attacking team tries to tag the runners using speed, agility, and a quick relay touch accompanied by the word "kho."

The process started with the girls spreading out to clear the court of rocks. Sinc ethey play in bare feet, I can imagine how painful that could be. Then, they constructed the court using string and chalk. Each line was placed with care and precision. After the court was established, then then played!

Getting my bearings

After a good breakfast and a nap, I had the opportunity to take a walk around Panchsheel School. The children had a cultural festival this morning and the rest of the day “off” - although - since most of them live on the premises - they were here on campus. I walked around to see new projects: new brick covering the previously dirt gathering spaces and walkways, the new kitchen/dining area that is paved, covered and safe from weather, and a new wing of the girls’ hostel to give them more living space. I will take an official tour later this week, but I was impressed by the changes made so far.

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Traveling and Being Received

I have travelled by over night train many time -i am grateful that my friend and partner in this work, Mr. Bajirao Gawai - makes my reservation and buys my ticket. Most years, one of the family take me to the airport and find my bearth, but this year I did it all by myself! I can tell you how proud I was to understand that the platform had been changed and I was able to find the new platform, the correct car, the correct compartment and the seat I was assigned. I have travelled this route many times and I always find people to be helpful, if not a little curious as towho I am and why I am there.

As I arrived to the school, all the children (600+) were gathered to greet me! The teachers and students of Panchsheel School are so welcoming and I even had an opportunity to visit with 2 of the nursing students we supported through school. They came to welcome me - they are each doing internship work on hospitals in Paratwada! Full-fledged nurses!

Day 3 in Mumbai - reflecting on why I do what I do

Day 3 began with the thought that I need to do something “different” so I researched the neighborhood and found a great coffee shop. (One of the things I love is to find a new coffee shop somewhere in the world, park myself for a few hours and journal, drink coffee, people-watch, etc.) So I ventured out only to find the coffee shop was closed. Sigh. So, I walked around the neighborhood and then returned to the hotel to do some computer work. After my nap, I walked over to the Taj for High Tea.

I did a little reflecting on how I’ve structured this trip - basically the same schedule every year - I visit the same restaurants, the same shops, stay in the same hotel. One of the reasons is this: On my first breakfast, one waiter stopped by my table with a big smile and said, “Welcome home.” I recognize the same gentlemen who work in the hotel, one man said he’s worked here for 26 years. I’ve been making these trips since 2008. It’s nice to be recognized and remembered.

Day 2 in Mumbai - noticing the details

Day 2 in Mumbai found me outside of the hotel! I caught a taxi and ventured into Colaba (the touristy area of Mumbai, where I stay…) to do some shopping. Back in the early days of my India-visits, I did all my Christmas shopping in Mumbai - quality gifts at low prices. Lately, I’ve been doing some essential gifts, a few things for myself and things I cannot live without. I always go into shopping thinking I don’t need anything for myself, but then I find those one or two things I love.

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After visiting FabIndia and the Artisans shop (2 of my favorites), I caught a cab to the Taj Hotel for lunch and journaling. IIt has rained on and off, but for the majority of my time outside the hotel, it was dry. Until I got out of the taxi in front of the hotel and had to figure out how to cross a busy street in the rain.

As I sat, writing in my journal and savoring some delicious masala chai, I noticed some details I wanted to capture: the way the curtain-folds hung in the window, the pattern of the china, the bubbles in my chai… Maybe that was my “job” today… to notice the details.

the story of a picture

Good morning on this second day of my stay in Mumbai. Hopefully, I can get out of the hotel today and explore a little. I am not in a rush, but I do realize my stay in Mumbai is pretty short and. if I am going to do some shopping, this is the time and place! I also need to make my annual excursion to the Taj Hotel for lunch and a walk around. It is one of my favorite places to just be.

I posted this photo last night with no explanation, so I thought I’d tell the story. I am staying on the second floor and across the way, workers are renovating an apartment. Becasue we are doing a bit of a renovation project back at NoHo FUMC, it peaked my interest. So I sat and watched them for a while, from my dry spot in my hotel room.

While I watched, the rain picked up and persisted. It is Monsoon season after all, and everyone here says “we need the rain.” There were perhaps eight men on the crew working. The one I was initially focused on was the man plastering the balcony, leaning over the top and plastering in the rain. It looked like he’d rebuilt it, or part of it, because it was all bricks and mortar when he started and he smoothed it out to be a lovely surface. Then I noticed the guy on his left in the window, standing in an open hole, laying the marble tile around the window sill. (It is pretty far up…) Then I noticed the guy on his right, sitting in an window space, maybe taking a break. Inside the apartment I could see people walking around making decisions on wall surfaces, electricity, painting and other inside whatnots.

I am always surprised and amazed by the way people adapt to their situations; the way we are productive even when the circumstances aren’t just right; the way other cultures make it work. It helps me to realize my privilege and also wonder at how unnecessarily complicated my culture can be.

Day 1 in Mumbai - and all the things I slept through

Hello friends,

It is 5PM in Mumbai and I slept the whole day. It wasn’t even a real decision, I made, just what my body needed. The flight landed at 1AM, and after immigration, baggage, and a taxi ride to Colaba, I arrived at the hotel at about 3:30AM. I slept for about 4 hours, then woke up and showered for breakfast. I did a little journalling and then, went back to bed and slept until 4PM! Apparently, my body and mind needed a break.

I ordered some room service dinner. mutter paneer and steamed rice with a Fresh lime soda! I have lots of stories to tell but most of them happened while I was really tired, so I need some time to reinterpret them when I am rested. Tomorrow I hope to feel better and do some shopping. It is raining pretty hard (Monsoon season) so I hope a good day’s rest will help me get back to normal.

In between

I have landed in Frankfurt, found my gate and am waiting for my flight to Mumbai. Our gate is filled with Indian folks who are laughing, FaceTiming with grandkids, having a great time. It is a stark contrast to the Germans who are navigating the airport, the cultural differences could not be more apparent!

Starting the journey

Well, the journey begins. The rituals remind me of so many previous trips and the habits to which I’ve become accustomed. In the last few years, I’ve taken to wearing very comfortable clothes for the airport visiting this “day” entails and no makeup! I don’t have too much time in the Frankfurt airport, but it may be good to wash my face and brush my teeth in an airport loo.

My driver was early to pick me up this morning, so I have some extra time in the airport. I enjoyed a good lunch, wrote some in my journal, and now am waiting at my gate.

3 days to go!

I am getting ready to leave for my annual trip to India. This year will be my 13th trip and I am getting packed and making all my final preparations. I will be in India for 3 weeks this year (after realizing - again - 2 weeks was not enough time last year) . Because I will be away from the church for 3 weeks, I’ve been working to tie up those loose ends before I leave. Thankfully, our church community is very self-reliant and our staff is amazing, so I don’t worry about them, but my anxieties abound.

My journey looks like this:
August 3: Leave LAX for Frankfurt (11 1/2 hours in the air, 2 hours on the ground in Frankfurt)
August 4: Leave Frankfurt for Mumbai (8 1/2 hours in the air)
August 5: Arrive in Mumbai and stay for a few days
August 7: Overnight train to Amravati (12 hours) then drive to Bahiram (2 hours)

I arrive at my second home on August 8th! 36 hours of active travel (or passive travel... sitting as a vehicle as I move in space) but 5 days of journeying to Bahiram.

The good news is that I love traveling, airports, hotels, the freedom and opportunity allowed. And the journey home all happens the same way in reverse, but all in one day!