And Ode to Laundry and other little joys of life

A day in the life of Susan: Well, to be honest, lately it has been a day every two weeks in the life of Susan. At home I pretty much hated doing laundry. I mean, it was so much work to haul my basket full of laundry down to my car and drive to my parents house (‘cause there was no way I was gonna spend 5 bucks to do two loads of laundry), and then put it into two piles, load the first pile in and hang out for an hour. Then move it to the dryer and add the second load. Wait some more, visit with my parents, then fold the clothes and add the second load to the dryer and hang out with my family some more. I mean seriously, such a monotonous task, right? haha oh if only!

When the team came here from home last month, one of the women innocently asked me what the bucket in the bathroom was for. Me and the interns chuckled ‘cause really, it is used for EVERYTHING. That bucket is a necessary household item here. Let me describe how I do laundry in India. Like I mentioned, I sometimes just forget to do it for 2 weeks, until I am absolutely out of clean clothes and the not-clean clothes are beyond wearable. So… You fill the bucket up with water, add a load of laundry to it with some detergent. Swoosh it around and get all your clothes clean (or as clean as a 20 year old with a short attention span gets anything clean by hand). Rinse each item. Wring each item out. Take it up on the roof to hang it to dry. Wait for it to dry. Take it all down and supposedly iron said clothes.

As much as I sometimes find it a hassle—cause as I mentioned, I tend to forget about it until I have no wearable clothes left—I take much more joy out of my clean clothes. When you have to work for it, it’s actually more valued. I know this is such a basic concept and it’s kinda sad that this foundational life principle is hitting home most for me through doing my laundry. But I also enjoy doing laundry now. Although it is time consuming, it is so wonderful to have some physical labor! Its hard work! I’m quite in awe of the women who wash sheets and saris (I haven’t become brave enough to try those yet) because even washing the small items is quite vigorous, let alone 3 meters of material! Another reason I love doing laundry is having an excuse to walk around on the roof at night. Architecture in India is wonderful if simply for the roofs. To be above the busyness of the city, or the busyness of campus is so peaceful during the day, and at night to be a bit closer to the stars. I go up just to hang up laundry and end up stopping and being in awe of the one who made such beautiful, peaceful nights. Roofs are also quite wonderful for oatmeal breakfast picnics with friends :)

Eating. Who ever would have realized that eating with your hands is harder than eating with a fork? We’ve been told numerous times that we’re like little children when we eat. After years of being scolded to not play with your food and to not eat with your hands, I’m having to relearn it! It just makes sense! I might still be messy, but it is now easier for me to eat Indian food with my hands than with a fork. I’ll often just pick up a fork out of habit just to abandon it 5 minutes into the meal out of frustration!

Another random wonderful thing about India is that the cars play songs when they are backing up. And every car has its own little song. Not quite the annoying beeping huge trucks play when they back up at home!

And the head bobble. You never really know if the person is saying “yes,” “no,” “I hear you,” “you’re crazy,” or “I have no idea what this crazy fast-talking American is saying to me, I wish she would just stop babbling.” And when I ask a yes or no question and get the response of ‘no problem’ or ‘its ok.’ After 2+ months, I also don’t know what that means. The more I am here and the better I’m getting at communicating (I have acquired the ability to actually talk slower and to annunciate more! For those of you at home, you should realize that this is a giant improvement for me), the more I’m wondering how and if anyone actually understood me in the beginning.

Other things that make me happy:
Tiger ‘biscuits” (really, they are similar to shortbread cookies)
weekly (or bi-weekly) dinner dates with Elise

Internet is working

Being called ‘teacher’ by every child under the age of 15

I have two tailor friends who are going to help me have clothes that actually fit me!
getting chatty emails from people back home
one of the girls on campus who makes the most amazing crow sound (long story)
and...

Parasite Pals (… a children’s toy much like Polly Pocket) with characters such as ‘Holly Hostess,’ ‘Dig Dig the Head Louse,’ ‘Blinky the Eylash Mite,’ Zzeezz the bed bug’ and my personal favorite ‘Tickles the Tapework.’—I think I seriously laughed for 15 minutes when I first saw it)

The caption reads: “Here is the girl with small friends of life present for always. Some irritation she finds with them, but much fun and love is to be shared.”

Trust me there are a whole lot of more serious things that make me love India and make me joyful. But for lightheartedness’ sake I’m going to leave it at that!

Happy Independence Day!

August 15, 2007:

Several weeks ago I saw these kids as a sea of faces, but as I’ve spent the last three weeks helping out a bit in the school, names are beginning to match with faces. More than that though, their faces are beginning to match with homes, with families, with stories. Once a week medical camps go out of the various slum areas nearby. Although I go to these places in the mornings more regularly to help, these camps take place in the afternoon when the school children are home. We get to talk with them, meet their families, see their homes. Without fail, the next day we will be greeted by these students dressed smartly in their school uniforms, actively engages in their chance for a future. Grasping the hope handed to them through school. Coming from a society where as I child I would be glad to be sick because I could avoid going to school, I am blown away by their devotion and enthusiasm for their studies. Speaking as a girl who pretty much has sold my life away to my education, I’m realizing how much I have taken it for granted. At the medical camp yesterday, Elise and I talked to a group of Muslim girls from the wealthy family whose home abutted the slum area we were spending time in. I could tell each girl was quite intelligent—particularly Nazine. She was outgoing, spoke English extraordinarily well, and was composed and self-assured. I had been learning that here wealth leads to education, as it does most of the time in the states. Nazine calmly informed us that her and her female cousins would be finished with school after the tenth grade. She commented rather indignantly that although the girls studied and worked much harder at their schoolwork than the boys, they would not be allowed by their families to go further than the 10th grade in their education. What does one say to this? All I could do is to encourage them to continue studying and learning on their own. It shook me up, but really reminded me all that an education stands for--no matter what part of the world one is in.

So today was India’s independence day. It has been such an amazing day thusfar! This morning was a program at the school. The students were dressed so smartly and sang and dance with such pride. They were dressed beautifully and radiated joy and pride in their country. The speeches told of their thankfulness and hope for continued progress in India as it presses on in its journey of freedom. It was powerful and really just so cute! The kids did a wonderful job and had worked so hard and performed so energetically! I loved it :)

The rest of Independence Day was just fun! There was a youth gathering--just a bunch of teenagers hanging out, playing games and watching a movie. It was refreshing! Its very cool to me that India has a sense of national pride that appears to be fast fading in the life of the average American.

Life in India is already looking much different. I feel more this week that India is home. I’m beginning to get a feel for the different areas of work here and am getting my feet in many of them. I’m very bad at conveying the emotions that I’ve been feeling here. Most of the time in the clinic the patients have a cold or gastritis. But other times I feel fairly heart-wrenched. This little girl (the smallest one) came into the clinic about 3 weeks ago.





I had been very busy that day running in and out taking care of some patients, but Dr. Anna stopped me and told me to go and listen to the girls heart beat. The girl had a congenital heart defect—she was born with a hole in her heart. This prevents her from developing properly. She is two years old and can’t walk and is no where near where she should be developmentally. During the medical camp at the pipe village (her home) I was blown away at how small and frail she looks. She needs surgery so badly, but with her family’s situation there is no way that they can afford it. Her name is Neha. Please pray that money will come in to meet this girl’s needs. Kanchan also lives at the pipe village. She is in the ninth grade and is so intelligent! I was talking with her today (she speaks nearly impeccable English) about her family. She lives with her family (mom, dad, and 3 siblings) in the summer in a neighboring state and has spent every year minus that time with her grandparents in this village. It was eye-opening to talk to this girl. She has such faith and hope and such a strong foundation. She wants to be a doctor and I have no doubts that this dream will be attained. It’s strange to describe how uplifting it is to be there in the pipe village. These are families who are brought in to work in a pipe factory. They make their homes out of the discarded pipes.




I watched two of my friends work there every day for the last 6 weeks and to go into the same village with their same kids and to see the impact that they have left on their lives is beyond encouraging. It reminded me that sometimes the littlest things make an impact on those around us. The smallest sentence we utter can influence one person even a little. Me and Dr. Anna have gotten to know each other much better in the last few weeks and I’ve become more confident in expressing my own opinions and views on certain issues. Last year God taught me a lot about grace and convicted me on the subject in incredible ways. I had shared that with her a couple of weeks back and honestly thought she wasn’t listening to me. Turns out that telling my story encouraged her to show grace to someone close to her. It surprised me, really, but made me realize a bit more fully what my role is here.

I went on an airport run this morning. I had spent the night with a friend 20 mins from campus and I just LOVE taking rickshaws at 8 in the morning by myself (sarcasm). And there was an airport pickup so they just picked us up on the way and then took everyone back to campus afterwards. It was the first time I had been spent time in the airport since I’ve arrived here. It was just weird. I was forcing myself to recall all the overwhelmed, confused, naïve feelings and emotions I had when I still have no idea what to expect. It was strange, but it made me realize how confident and adjusted I’ve become in the last two months! I mean, given most of the time I am still really clueless, but I’m OK with being clueless (and for those who know me well, you know I usually like to know what on earth is going on and don’t like to be confused). But here, there’s very little that isn’t confusing so if every time I let it get me overwhelmed, I’d be fairly immobilized.

Random facts of India: When cars backup, instead of a beeping sound, they play little songs—its like a ringtone for cars!

Indian men have small bladders. I have gotten very good at looking straight ahead or determinedly at the road in front of me. But when you are riding side-saddle on a scooter, there are things that are just hard not to see as much as you desire not to!

Some major roads don’t actually have street names and business cards even put landmarks for directions instead of just an address.