The Purpose in Pink?

When I first decided on this blog title with my friend Danielle I knew that my last blog before heading back to India would be the same name as the title. And now here the post is- 11 of the shortest and infinite weeks of my life. With only a few brief hours before I leave for the airport I'm trying to process my purpose here. There is no way that one blog post could at all summarize what that purpose has been and I think that the effects of this summer will continue to become more and more clear as I get settled in home, study sociology, and start thinking about jobs and/or grad school (eek!). Nonetheless this summer has shaped me in some key ways I'd like to discuss.

I have wanted 'to help others' for as long as I can remember. Coming here I have been so humbled in this hope. It is a good goal and one that I still have, but in the face of so many seemingly endless problems I have had to confront my own smallness. This is not to say that no difference can be made, I have seen how a small group, or even a single dedicated person can create a huge difference, but this requires perseverance and often much difficulty. In the midst of being overwhelmed or despondent I have turned to Psalms 37:5 "Commit your ways to the Lord, trust in Him, and He will act". I must rely on God to be the Savior of this world, not on Bethany. I need to be faithful to what He asks and puts before me, but in the end leave it to Him to work and to act. I can not carry the weight of the world on my shoulders (it is narcissistic and catastrophic to even try) but I still have to try and lighten its load on others.

This summer taught me the importance of information and listening. Without knowing a culture, speaking the language or even looking like those that you help there are many barriers to helping. In a worst case scenario the helping can even lead to hurting. I learned from Jatinder, the founder of Prayas, of the story of a small disabled boy who found in a slum, living in the corner of his house totally neglected by family and very malnourished. When his story hit the newspapers a local NGO volunteered to take care him, but they gave him too much food at once and because of his malnourished state it killed him. Good intentions but with an awful result.

India has made me tougher in several ways. While it has revealed to me my weakness with blunt and painful honesty it has also showed me how I can be strong. I have always been sensitive to criticism. When I was young my mom could discipline with a single upset look and I would burst into tears. I learned better to take criticism through karate and playing the cello but I have never enjoyed it, and have a tendency to take it very personally. By the end of this summer I could receive criticism like "that's garbage", take it, fix it, and present something that was acceptable without having a huge blow to my self-confidence. I have also become more willing to stick it up for myself and others. Though never exactly a people pleaser I prefer to avoid conflict, and sometimes allow others to hurt me rather than fighting back. This has been the case in India but in the last couple weeks I have become more fierce. Whether bargaining hard with rickshaw drivers to not get as ripped off (almost impossible for it not to happen a little), yelling at a guy for trying to take pictures of my friends and I, or gesturing at a guy to stop staring at me and the girls on the train back from Pushkar. For the first several weeks the stares from so many Indians, especially men, was incredibly taxing, but by now I've almost gotten used to it- at least it doesn't make me want to scream or cry anymore.

(I leave in 2 hours and need to finish packing so this will have to come to a shorter close but a little more...)

So what have I been doing this last week? I've volunteered 4 mornings at an NGO called Prayas, primarily working in their integrated school for disabled and non-disabled children teaching simple sums, working through english stories and supervising Paint on the computer (I miss Paint). I've learned a lot through talking with Jatinder and seeing such an effective operating organization- over 90% of children in their 4 schools come from slums. Their first class of graduates have entered into international banks and had many other success stories. Though she has received much acclaim for her work, the president of India and Bill Clinton visited Prayas, she still sits in on classes to spend time teaching and playing with the children. She says that as long as you love what you're doing and can see the difference you make in others lives all the difficulties are worth it. After volunteering there today another woman who volunteers offered to drive me back to my house, but first she served me lunch at her house. We had a lovely time discussing India and the American girls that she has hosted on exchange for the last seven years. Yesterday I went to HEDCON for my goodbye party. We had chocolate cake, potato chips, Thumbs Up (Indian version of Pepsi), and samosas, and everyone said very kind goodbyes before I left. Earlier in the week I went gone into the pink city to do some last minute shopping, dressed up in sari's and ate dinner in a revolving restaurant and giggled tons with Menna and Verena. I've also spent three evenings in a row packing- and everything fits. Now I just got to figure out the weight issue.

This may or may not be my last post of this blog, but I wanted to wrap up with a few last questions and thank yous:

What am I going to miss about India?

• Menna and the other intern girls
• Beautiful skies, sunsets and huge monsoon storms
• Exploring ancient forts in gorgeous hills
• Rooftop hangouts and restaurants
• All the colors
• Wearing Indian clothes and admiring other women's saris
• Traveling cheaply to exotic places on the weekends
• Rickshaws (believe it or not)
• How the cows make me laugh
• Making funny accents

What am I looking forward to in the US?

• Not being stared at
• Feeling safe more consistently
• Simple and safe food
• Lake Michigan and Pacific Northwest Mountains
• Moving into my own apartment and the privacy that comes with it
• Being in a church building once again, and entering back into Christian community at RUF (Reformed University Fellowship)
• Being with my family and US friends again
• Actual clean clothes
• Hearing English spoken and communicating easily with others
• Riding in cars
• A long hug at the airport

I want to give a special thanks to my friends Jackie, Rachel, Molly, and Ethan for their consistent support and encouraging emails and facebook chats. Thank you to SIGP for supplying a huge share of the grant money that got me here, and all the others that supported me financially in this venture. Thank you Adam for your wisdom, friendship, and love. Thank you my dear family: my parents for their support of their 19/20 year old daughter heading off into a strange land and my awesome brothers who give the best pep talks in the world. I am so loved. All of your kindness and support has meant the world to me.

USA here I come!!!!!

Pictures

These guys served us lunch every monday through friday for the last eleven weeks

On our bus to pushkar. The cricket that flew into my face is missing.

Pushkar lake

All covered at the sikh temple

Clothes and cows

Climbing up huge hill outside of pushkar

Epic cloud

So many monkeys

It was exhausting

But the view was so worth it

And the amazing clouds continued

Gorgeous sunset

I woke up early before sunrise.

Here comes the sun doo doo doo doo 

The bag of mystery. We each bought each other a mystery outfit. I will see it tomorrow.

I think a camel and cow mated?

Back in Jaipur taking the rickshaw back from volunteering

(Sorry for the sideways) pretty flowers in the yard at the house

Taru Chayya Nagar (our street) at sunset. Standing on Tonk Road

Did I really just say that?

In fact I think they did. I might need Menna to verify it, but yesterday I'm pretty sure that in sequential order I said I think "I'm going to miss India". Menna, Verena, and I were sitting on a hill close by the monkey temple in Jaipur over looking the whole city. It was cool to look down and recognize places that I've been- where I've eaten, shopped, got lost, explored, buildings and hills I've climbed and so on. Though there is still so much more to see in Jaipur (not to mention India) I have made Jaipur my temporary summer home. The roads to and from my house are particularly familiar and I can navigate the rickshaw drivers when needed to arrive safely at my house using hand gestures and feeble attempts at Hindi vocabulary.

I had an amazing weekend. I left Saturday evening for Pushkar with 5 other intern girls. We spent the next two days shopping in awesome markets and climbing this huge hill at sunset with one of the most stellar views I have ever seen in India. Their company and the awesome sights and great food truly made it a weekend to remember- I dare say the best couple days that I have had in India. Right now I don't have access to my computer but I hope to upload more pictures from the trip soon. I think they are the best way to communicate my travels better than anything else.

This week I am all finished with HEDCON. So now I'm doing a bit of volunteering at a local school that integrates mentally disabled children with the rest of children into one school. Mostly I just draw elephants for the kids to color and help them practice their numbers and english alphabet. It's not exactly what I expected I would do coming to Prayas but I am enjoying it nonetheless. I will volunteer a couple more mornings this week, have at least one day off for the muslim holiday celebrating the end of Ramadan, pack my things and return. Though it will be mostly sweet, the goodbyes, especially to Menna and the green green hills surrounding this crazy city will be somewhat bitter. At the moment I'm doing my last load of hand laundry (huge fist pump for the return of laundry machines in a few days), writing a few postcards, and maybe a nap before the girls return and we go out for a night on the town.

Pictures coming soon!

From Garbage to Well Done

I'm sorry to say it like this but..."It's garbage"

This is the first round of feedback I got on the introduction to the report I submitted to my boss yesterday. Though his critiques were not all on things I wrote, they were on things that I had read and approved. It is probably the most harsh feedback I have ever received. However I determined that I was not going to finish my 10ish weeks of internship with that sort of critique and so I worked hard all the workday ong following "it's garbage" to make the report into something readable. I sent the revised document back to my boss who came over this evening before he left to tell me "well done". That simple well done and firm handshake afterwards might be one of the most important compliments that I have received.

In a way I feel this way about India. 5 weeks ago I felt like I was wasting my time here and I was feeling both incredibly critical of myself as well as upset at AIESEC, my internship and Jaipur/India in general for making everything so difficult. However especially in the last few weeks after a great trip with Menna in Jaisalmer and more substantial work at HEDCON I feel much better about my time. I also visited a couple special needs school through Prayas, the NGO that works with special needs children that I have mentioned before. It was great to see a well functioning NGO and I will be going back next week several times to play with the kids (I drew suns for them to fill and made paper airplanes, only after realizing that I was folding up their artwork that supposed to be on display, woops! but the kids loved it :)

Now I'm about to head with 5 other interns to the relaxing town of Pushkar for several days of relaxing fun, and more climbing hills to see the sunrise and sunset. I can head into my week of my own time and fun time feeling like I have done a job well done. Maybe/definitely not what I had expected but well done nonetheless.

Do not turn away

In the Bible God speaks through the prophet Isaiah to tell the Israelites,

“Is not this the kind of fasting I [God] have chosen: to loose the chains of injustice and untie the cords of the yoke, to set the oppressed free and break every yoke?  Is it not to share your food with the hungry and to provide the poor wanderer with shelter— when you see the naked, to clothe them, and not to turn away from your own flesh and blood?"Isaiah 58:6-7

The most heartbreaking thing about India is the children. Hardly two days go by without a child under the age of seven begging from us. It feels so heartless to act like they aren't there and keep walking, or when they beg while stopped in traffic to continue to staring forward and not look at them. Most of the time I try to at least look into their faces and say 'no' but it doesn't change anything. When I first arrived in India this wasn't the case? I had been so warned to ignore and not give money that I wouldn't even look into their faces (surprisingly easy to do when they are below your waist). I remember the first moment I looked down to the three faces around my faces. Dirty clothes and faces that ranged from gleeful, cunning, sad, despairing and hardened. They are barefoot, naked, children holding children, when some of the saddest eyes that I have ever seen. What can I do? How do I help without hurting?

Yesterday when our rickshaw was stopped a young beautiful girl came by the rickshaw and tried to sell Menna some balloons, but when Menna didn't buy them the girl pinched her really hard and then walked away. I've been hit, pulled and mobbed by groups of up to 8 children all demanding pooki (food) or money. There's one particular boy at the bus stop on our way to work who continues to touch his hands to my bare dirty feet and then touching them to his stomach and then his face. I can be told over and over that most of these children are working for crime lords, and that giving them money in the long term only hurts them. I want to pick up them up in my arms and run with them all the way back to the United States. I want to pick them up and twirl them around in my arms until they giggle in delight. I want to split an ice cream cone with them and take them to see and smell the ocean. I want to send them to a good school where they can take pride in their lives and learn about what life can be like outside of the slums. Instead I shake my head no and walk on hoping that they'll leave soon.

"Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world." James 1:27. Is it the world's 'pollution' that says I should turn from these children and not give them anything? Is it the world's wisdom that I should just donate to an NGO that helps children but turn from them on the street? What beauty comes from this pain? Does God love the beggar child in India as much as the privileged white girl at an elite university (me)? Where is the sense in this pain? Is there any purpose to this? What can I possibly do? Anything? What can you do?

But man these times are hard

(I'm going to try to pull an analogy that may or may not work.) Recently I've been listening a lot to a song by the Script called The First Time: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CPEBN2dVNUY&ob=av2e. The song is relatively melancholy but eventually redemptive about a relationship that is going through difficult financial and emotional struggles. The analogy: we're just going to pretend that I'm in some form of relationship with India, or maybe I should say Jaipur. The premise of the song is even amidst difficult the couple enjoys drinking cheap bottles of wine and staying up all night, and in these simple and joyous moments it's as if they are meeting for the first time.  The title of this post comes from they lyrics "we're trying to make it work but man these times are hard". I've struggled, lost, and gained in the fight to not only make India work but have it be a good experience. I wrote a blog earlier on about appreciating the small things here. This has continued. At least once very day there is something that makes me smile (even when I'm close to tears) weather Indian music blasting on loud speakers to celebrate the Lord Krishna holiday, making funny faces with Menna, the sweet smile of a young girl when she waves at us when we come to the neighborhood market or sun rays breaking through the monsoon clouds.

Last night was awesome. A friend of mine from Northwestern, Nicole, came to Jaipur to see me for the evening into the next morning on her way back to Delhi. We had an awesome time catching up about all sorts of things. It was wonderful to have a piece of home here in India, but not in a way that made me homesick, but just made me enjoy my time here all the more.

Market by our house

More pictures of beautiful sunsets

NICOLE!!!!!!!! <3

Thankfulness

I was reading a friend of mine's blog from this summer and was inspired to write my own short blog about things that I am thankful for. I'm going to do it picture style.

Menna. A dear friend. The kindest, funniest, awesomest, and wonderful friend I could have ever hoped to make in India. Our adventures and time of laughter in India will always remain in my memory the best part of this trip.

Our clean and safe house, with a kind family (and awesome rooftop)

The Amer Fort and the hills surrounding it. They are why I chose to come to Jaipur, and I have loved the five trips I have taken to come to this beautiful and peaceful place outside the city.

I saw this cloud yesterday after I got out of a very scary situation. Though I was family safe I still felt unsettled, but it's beauty calmed me and gave me hope.

Adapation: I visited this crazy nice mall with Menna and went speechless by it's fanciness. I experienced more culture shock entering this place than at any other point in India- when we returned to the dirty busy streets I felt right at home. It showed just how much I've adapted to this city.

Lays Classic Salted chips. Masala free. I hardly ever eat them in the US but here they taste like home. I've had several times traveling where these and chocolate chip cookies were my dinner.

The wind. During the monsoon it almost blows constantly. The wind can not be seen but it can be felt. It sculpts everything it touches either immediately over long periods of time.  Amidst my doubt, the wind against my face reminds me of God. Even as a I question His goodness through all these questions, the wind He created whispers against my skin reminding me that even if I can't see Him, He is here.

These beautiful flowers have been in bloom since my first day I landed in Jaipur. Through the first couple weeks of hot summer and now the rains of the monsoon they decorate almost every street and mountain with their beauty. 

Sun glasses and funny faces. Menna and I have a whole series of these but they are so fun and make us laugh even when we're getting stressed out or overwhelmed.

So many of my family and friends have been incredibly supportive in this time but I wanted  to give special thanks to my oldest brother, Aaron. His consistent love and support, from the very first day I considered India, to a fabulous pep talk the night before I left and his encouragement amidst the trials and triumphs of my time here have meant more than any thank you note could ever describe. He has modeled what it means to sacrifice your time for those you love, to think with a brilliant mind and fight for a heart of integrity; how to prance like a dinosaur and accept disappointment with grace and fortitude. I love you bro.