Holy $#!%, I'm in India!

2007-06-21T13:00:00.000+03:00

I Run, Therefore I Am.... Nuts

It's raining sideways. The temperature is 25 degrees Celsius (about 77 Fahrenheit), near the coldest I've felt in over 10 months, and there's a stiff wind. I've been running hard for about an hour. Despite the temperature and wind, I'm shirtless and steaming from my head and torso. I'm soaked not just to the skin, but THROUGH it, as if my flesh was just another piece of fabric. My organs are wet. Moreso than they are under normal circumstances, I'm sure. My shoes and socks are completely waterlogged and with each step, they squish and eject water back into the environment. Water streams into my eyes, and with each exhalation a shower spews from my lips and moustache. Like a kid in the bathtub, the tips of my fingers and toes are pink raisins. From stomping through puddles, my legs up to the mid-thigh where my shorts begin are covered with mud. After my run when I slow to a walk, my legs shake uncontrollably, exhausted to the point where they can barely support my weight. As my heart rate and body temperature start to drop back to normal, I'm exhausted, in pain, filthy, and freezing. I walk back to Chacko Homes, take a frigid shower and look forward to doing it again tomorrow.

Monsoon season is AWESOME.

2007-06-19T09:39:00.000+03:00

Update

I haven't written much since we got back from our All-India tour, and there's a definite reason for that. I had started to write at length on that reason, but have wisely, I think, decided to not be deliberately antagonistic. That, and the fact that the internet went out before I could post it yesterday. Blessings in disguise.

Instead of ranting about the attempted censorship of our blogs, I'm just going to write what I want to when I want to from now on, whether it's good, bad, ugly, or otherwise. Not everything I write is going to be deep, meaningful, or reflective. Not everything I write is going to be flattering for India, UC College, the people I know, or myself for that matter. I'm obviously not going to go out of my way to slander anybody or anything. But what I write will be honest, and will be a truthful depiction of MY PERCEPTIONS of the experiences I'm having. If you want objective reporting and analysis of social issues, go read The Economist or something.

Anywho...

I just want to catch people up on what's been going on with me here since we got back one month ago to the day. The southwest monsoon has finally started, as have classes at UC College. The temperature is now comfortably in the high 70's/low 80's. At night I'm sleeping in long pants, socks and a hoodie, I find these temperatures so cold. Even though students are back at the college and classes are back in session, I haven't really been doing much. I split my days now between the computer in the library, the canteen, and the reading room in the English Department. Of course I engage students, teachers and staff whenever I get the chance, but mostly I've just been checking and writing e-mails and reading. On Friday I start teaching some classes again, so things should pick up. A couple of days ago, I went into Ernakulam and recorded the narration for an online typing class. This is the second project I've provided narration for since I've been here. Maybe I should look into a job as a voice-over actor. And last week, I celebrated the Feast of St. Anthony of Padua at a Franciscan Monastery.

The proximity of the end of my term of service is driving me crazy. July 31st is still more than a month off, but it's looming incredibly large in my mind. No matter how hard I try, I can not keep my head in India; all I can think of is going home. I've been away from friends, family, and the comforts and distractions of my life in the US for so long, all I can think about is where I want to go to eat, what movies I want to watch, what games to play with my brother, what's the first song I'll play on my electric guitar, where I'll live, where I'll work, where I'll go on my long runs, what characters to roll in World of Warcraft. Argh!

So that, in brief, is where I'm at now. There's a bunch more stupid, non-reflective stuff I want to write, so I'm going to write it. Expect to hear a lot more from me in the coming days.

2007-06-01T12:35:00.000+03:00

The Road To Enlightenment

It's seven a.m., the 20th of April. We've spent the last three days on trains, only just having gotten our first good night's sleep in a hotel. We're bumping down a dirt road alongside a wide, dried up river; six people plus one driver in an autorickshaw. We're all relieved and excited to finally be headed to Bodh Gaya, the first actual destination on our All India Tour.

During the approximately hour long ride from the town of Gaya to Bodh Gaya, we passed through the crowded, dirty streets of a small town; thriving, verdant fields; arid, dusty, dead farms; we saw forests, plains, and hills, lives of opulent ease and luxury and of destitute poverty. I wonder how much of this scene is the same as when the Buddha walked this same road along the river 2500 years ago. Probably more than I expect.

I think about the stories I know of the Buddha's life. Born into the Ksatriya caste of warriors and heads of state, the Buddha (then Prince Siddhartha) was, throughout his early life, preened to be the ruler of the Sakya kingdom. Upon Siddhartha's birth, a sage proclaimed that he would go on to become a great leader, but would not say whether this would be in a spiritual or secular role. Determined that no son of his would ever become some crazy mystic, Siddhartha's father went to great lengths to keep his young son insulated from the "real world" by keeping him safe in the coccoon of palace life and surrounding him with only beauty and all the good things of life. Eventually, however, Siddhartha began to have the feeling that there must be more to life than just the limited exposure he was granted. He wanted to see what was outside the palace, and so convinced his servant and companion to take him out. During the course of three separate trips outside the palace, Siddhartha saw people afflicted by the three unavoidable types of suffering we all face-- sickness, old age, and death. He also, almost certainly, saw poverty and the way that most people have to struggle simply to survive. He became aware of the injustices of the caste system and began to doubt the religion he was taught to believe from birth that imposed these arbitrary and cruel strictures on those he recognized as fellow humans. His eyes opened to what life really was for the majority of people, Siddhartha knew that he could not continue to lead his insular palatial life, and set out to find out What It's All About. He went from teacher to teacher, tradition to tradition. He was an apt pupil and quickly outstripped every teacher he had, but he never got a satisfying answer to his questions. For several years, he practiced the strictest austerities, sure that mortification of the body was the only way to attain enlightenment. Eventually, however, he decided that asceticism just makes you physically weak and does nothing to foster realization and he wandered, dejected and disillusioned, down from the mountains and walked along a river until he came to a forest outside the village of Uruvella-- today, Bodh Gaya. There he sat down under a tree. And just sat. Local children would come and give him rice and ricemilk each day to keep his body strong and able to support his concentration and practice of meditation. And as he sat, Siddhartha saw into the true nature of all things-- nothing exists independently, in and of itself. Each thing depends on all other things for its existence. We suffer because we cling to the idea of a separate, independent self which does not exist. And he formulated an Eightfold Path that could guide one to realize his selflessness and interdependence with all the rest of creation.

In the Soto Zen tradition, we are told that we are all already Buddhas. Our fundamental nature is Buddha Nature and thus there is nothing to attain; there is no special state of mind we need to realize; we do not have to "try to create a Buddha." Everything we do, whatever we do, is an expression of our Buddhanature.

Maybe I'm too cynical to be a good Buddhist, I don't know. I feel like most of us are a much more similar to Prince Siddhartha than we are to the Buddha, the Awakened One. Or maybe a more apt analogy is that we're like Siddhartha's father, and our minds, our consciences, our consciousnesses are like Siddhartha-- who eventually grows up to become the Buddha. We do everything we can to avoid pain and suffering. We're obsessed with safety and security and insulate ourselves so that the Real World doesn't intrude upon our peace of mind and sense of wellbeing. We keep ourselves constantly busy and distracted so that we never have to acknowledge or confront the suffering in ourselves or in the world. But try as we might, I think we all experience some feeling of dissonance. A feeling that Something Isn't Quite Right Here. Despite our best efforts, our feeling of peace, wellbeing and security isn't quite complete. What gives??

And at this point we have a choice. We can ignore the feeling, insulate and anaesthetize ourselves further, go deeper into our snuggly, happy castle and forget that there is a whole world outside. Or we, like Siddhartha, can choose to investigate what's out there; become aware of what is happening outside of our safe, warm fortress and risk finding out unpleasant things and having to deal with our complicity in them. This awareness, I think, is our first step on the journey if we are honestly going to walk with the Buddha, Christ, and all the other great teachers who have trodden it before and continue to tread it with us. Like Siddhartha, once we are aware of the suffering that exists outside (and indside, even though we notice that even less) our palace walls, we really have no choice but to change the way we are living and devote our lives-- often, it seems, with a lot of trial and error-- to finding another way.

2007-05-26T08:16:00.000+03:00

The Rundown

We just got back last weekend from our All India Tour. The purpose of the tour, as far as I can imagine, was to give us a broader, fuller picture of India. Since one area of the country differs from every other area in its language, dress, food, religious makeup, political system, geography, weather, and pretty much every other way imaginable, the only way to even begin to aproach an idea of what "India" is is to see and experience as much of the diversity as possible. Kerala, in particular, seems to be a particularly anomalous state, so getting to see other parts of the country was a very valuable experience.

But aside from calculated exposure to other parts of India, the Tour also proved to be several other things. Some parts of the trip tested our behaviour and tempers as Christians, Buddhists, and whatever-the-heck else we are (tests which we roundly failed); other parts were almost like a vacation; the whole thing was an experiment in group decision-making, and communal use of money and other resources.

I intend to write a sort of series of vignettes that will detail certain experiences I had and my reactions to them and reflections on them, and let this patchwork give you an idea of what the tour was like. But before I do that, I'll give a rundown of the places I went just so there is some sort of context for the forthcoming vignettes.

Our trip was sort of screwed from the beginning. We had booked our first train ticket back in February, from Ernakulam to Varanasi-- it would be a 50 hour train ride in an a/c coach that would get us to one of the most important sites in India and leave us in a good position to explore the north of the country. When we booked that train, we didn't actually get reservations-- we were put on the waiting list, but told "Don't worry, you'll get on." As the weeks went by, and we were still wait-listed, we were still told there would be no problem. People would cancel their tickets and we would end up getting berths. The day of our departure arrived, the other YAVs came up to Ernakulam from Kottayam, and we were still wait-listed. When they asked the head ticket examiner if we'd be able to get on the train, his precise words were "Not a chance."

Fortunately, the Chief Reservation Officer in Ernakulam was super cool and helpful and hooked us up with tickets to Chennai (Madras), from whence we could avail the Foreign Tourist Quota and arrange tickets to the north. However, we still had to wait two additional days in Kerala for the train to Chennai. But, we eventually made it to Chennai with no problem, got there around 7am and were some of the first people in line when the Reservation Office opened. Here we learned a very useful fact that got us through the majority of our tour-- the railway stations in most major cities have a Foreign Tourist Reservation Office. A reservation office just for foreigners where the people are actually helpful (for the most part) and help clueless tourists figure out how to get where they're going and go to great lengths to get you on the train you need or help you figure out alternative means when that's not possible.

So we booked a bunch of tickets from the Chennai Station and, thanks to the diligent efforts of the woman at that office, we were able to set out for the north that very day. Rather than going to Varanasi first, we had to take a train to a place called Mughalsarai, which was actually closer to Gaya, where we had planned to go after Varanasi. But that was fine. We could go to Gaya first, then head over to Varanasi. But the train ride to Mughalsarai was a NIGHTMARE. The train was packed to such an extent that one could barely move. You couldn't even get to the toilet at night because every inch of floor was covered with sleeping bodies and their bags. Making things even worse, the horde of men that situated themselves in the aisle next to us and occasionally intruded upon our reserved seats were of an especially rude, leering, hostile variety. None of the women in our group felt comfortable sleeping with those eyes on them. And we had to endure this for two days.

But we survived, got to Mughalsarai, and later that day caught the six-hour-long train to Gaya. We arrived at Gaya in the afternoon of our fourth day out from Kerala and just found a hotel and showered, washed clothes, and rested. The following morning we set out for nearby Bodh Gaya. Bodh Gaya is the town that has been set up around the site of the Buddha's elightenment. While the focal point is the Mahabodhi Temple complex, which actually houses the Bodhi Tree itself (the tree the Buddha was meditating under when he attained enlightenment-- well, not that actual tree anymore, but its direct descendant), Bodh Gaya is also home to temples from all the Buddhist denominations, and an 80' tall Great Buddha Statue. And lots of people trying to cash in by selling Buddhist swag. While I was standing there admiring the Bodhi Tree, a twig and a couple of leaves fell off it. I picked them up and the guards motioned that I could hang onto them. So I have some pieces of the Bodhi Tree. I think that's pretty cool.

After Bodh Gaya, we caught an early morning train to Varanasi. Varanasi is a really cool old city; in fact, it's the oldest continually inhabited city in the world. In addition to that, it is the holiest city in the Hindu tradition, and thousands of pilgrims and tourists arrive there every day. The dominant feature of Varanasi is the Ganges River, upon which the city is built, and the ghats, giant stairways that go from the city down to the river. The ghats are used for pujas (devotional ceremonies), ceremonial bathing in the river, and for funerals and cremations. The city itself is mostly made up of alleys too narrow for even an auto rickshaw to fit down, and is crowded with merchants, beggars, cows, tourists, pilgrims and sunyasis (holy men). It very nicely meets the romantic, mystical, Orientalist notions that most of us have about India. Our first night there we attended a huge puja on one of the main ghats, and then got to see a performance of classical sitar and tabla music over dinner. The highlight of this part of the trip for me was when the sitar player saw me inspecting his instrument after the concert and sat me down and began teaching me to play it! Early the next morning, we got to take a sunrise boat ride on the Ganges and see the city's riverfront by boat. It was beautiful, and the perspective we got of the city was overwhelming. We spent the rest of that day just kind of wandering around and shopping, but I did end up at one of the Burning Ghats, where cremation ceremonies take place. I wrote about that in my most recent newsletter, and will probably do a post about it in a little while, so I won't write about it here.

That afternoon around 5, we caught a 12 hour train to Delhi and arrived safely the following noon (the math only works if you're familiar with Indian Standard Time). At this point the group split up, and while the rest of the group stayed in Delhi for a few days, Alicia and I got right on another train and went up to Pathankot in Himachal Pradesh, from whence we took a 5 hour bus ride at 5am to Dharamsala/McLeod Ganj in the foothills of the Himalayas. Dharamsala is the name commonly given to the town that serves as the Dalai Lama's home in exile, the centre of the exiled Tibetan theocracy, and the epicentre of the Tibetan refugee community in India. But the actual name of the town is McLeod Ganj. Dharamsala is about 4 km down the mountain and really just has a marketplace, some restaurants, and a couple of hotels. McLeod Ganj was BEAUTIFUL!! If you looked in one direction you could see the plains of northern India stretching away to the horizon. In the other direction were the snowcapped peaks of the Himalayas. I've never seen anything so amazing in my life. Mostly we just walked around enjoying the views, eating awesome Tibetan food and, under the pretext of supporting the Tibetan refugee community, brought a crap ton of stuff. Disappointingly, I got really sick our second day there (our only full day) and didn't leave the hotel room at all. The third day there, we visited the main temple complex, which is supposedly a near duplicate of the temple in Lhasa. McLeod Ganj was cool in the same way as Bodh Gaya, in that there were Buddhist monks and nuns walking around all over the place, somtimes mumbling prayers. Of course, at Bodh Gaya there were monks from all different traditions, while McCleod Ganj was pretty much exclusively Tibetan Buddhist. But still, both places were infused with a sense of peace and mindfulness that it was very refreshing to dwell in.

We left McLeod Ganj the same we had come, taking the bus back down to Pathankot in the evening and getting on an overnight train to Delhi. After a very brief stop in Delhi-- just an afternon where we just showered, slept, and ate-- we headed down to Bangalore (about 2 days on the train) so Alicia could catch her flight back to the States. After she left, I took a train west to Goa where I just relaxed and waited for the rest of the group. Goa is like Hawai'i for Europeans and Aussies. Its palm-fringed beaches and cerulean waters are the kind of things postcard makers dream of. Not a bad place to spend a week while my friends were trudging through the desert in Rajasthan. After a week on my own there, the others joined me and, together, we spent another week in Goa before heading back to our sites in Kerala.

Our tour was a nice, long break from the multitude of stresses I encounter trying to be an accepting, accepted, and productive member of the community in and around UC College. And while it was replete with stresses of its own, they are the stresses that any tourist or traveler will encounter. And that's much less alienating than feeling that I'm totally on my own in my struggles. But now I'm back in Alwaye, the only white person for 60 km in any direction, committed to making the most of my last two months here. I feel rested, relaxed, refreshed, and enthusiastic.... It's going to be a good couple of months.

Stay tuned for more detailed posts on the places we visited...

2007-03-28T12:53:00.000+03:00

A Lesson in Karma

Every night for the last few weeks, my room has been plagued by little black beetle sort of things. I wish I could say definitely what they are, but that's the best I can do. No one seems to know what they're called, even though I see them everywhere. They don't bite, they don't sting, they don't make noise. They're completely harmless, as far as I can tell. But after 7pm, they're EVERYWHERE. On my walls, on my floor, in my bathroom, on my desk, amongst my books, on the little Buddha statue I got in Sri Lanka, on my bed and pillow, on (and in) my guitar. And when I sit totally still to meditate and when I lay down to go to sleep, they're all over me.

I try to refrain from destroying any kind of life as much as possible. But when it's after midnight and I'm exhausted, hot and sweaty, and have been laying in bed awake since 10 and one of these little bugs lands on my face, I just get so... MAD. Every bug that lands on me while I'm trying to sleep gets crushed between my thumb and forefinger and flicked to the floor.

So now my floor is covered with little black chitinous corpses. Not only do I feel guilty for destroying living beings when I see the little beetle charnel ground, but the pile of corpses has now attracted a colony of carnivorous red ants. So now there are tiny little flesh devouring red ants EVERYWHERE in my room. And they see the human form for what it really is-- a big heap of decaying meat.

So now, not only is my room still being invaded by beetles every night, I'm also covered with painful red ant bites; most of which have been delivered in the most inconvenient (and painful!) places imaginable at the most inconvenient times (usually while I'm in the middle of an afternoon nap).

Awesome.

2007-03-06T12:30:00.000+03:00

Pictures

For anyone who is interested, I've finally posted my pictures from the month of January and our travels in Andhra Pradesh. Just follow the link on my sidebar to see my pictures.

2007-03-06T08:24:00.001+03:00

Finally...

As I briefly (and skeptically) mentioned in the previous post, my friend Pradeep had been planning to conduct some interviews in the nearby dalit colonies. Against all odds, this has actually happened, and I've spent several recent evenings with him, talking to people in the colony. I've learned more in this past week than I have in the previous six months. Here is a little bit of what I've learned.

First, allow me to clarify what it means to be a dalit, as there are a lot of inaccurate impressions and assumptions floating around out there. Dalit is not a caste name-- there is no Dalit caste. Rather, this is a title that members of several of the lowest castes have taken upon themselves. "Dalit" translates literally to "ground down" or "downtrodden." Those who have been systematically oppressed, discriminated against, and excluded by the caste structure identify themselves as dalits as a means of asserting their identity and making explicit their status. Since this is a term that does not apply to a specific caste, it also serves to unify those who might otherwise only be working for the uplift of their own particular caste and to create a movement of the oppressed that transcends caste lines.

And while, by definition, any person who is systematically oppressed and denied rights, access to resources, and dignity could be called a dalit, the term is currently used mostly in reference to the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes (SCs and STs). When India's constitution was drafted in 1950, it outlawed caste discrimination and sought to redress the harm done to the lower castes and tribal peoples by identifying many of these as SCs and STs and creating reservations (think affirmative action) for members of the SCs and STs in higher educational institutions and in government posts and civil jobs, and by earmarking money to provide for uplift in the form of loans for education and housing. However, reservation only benefits a very few members of these communities and most of the money set aside for their development goes into the pockets of local officials whose job it is to distribute this money. So while Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes are the politicaly correct, sanitized terminology, many people still prefer the dalit title as they are not really benefitting from their inclusion as members of SCs and STs.

Another common misconception is that dalit means poor. While this is often the case, it is important to note that dalit is not a class identification. Not all dalits are poor, and not all poor people are dalits. It is true that it is hard for many dalits to find work. In many cases, traditional professions (which are largely, if not entirely, caste based) are being rendered obsolete by modernization (which, in and of itself, is not a bad thing. Yes, I'm kind of a bleeding heart, but I'm not that bad...) and many people are being forced to either relocate to more urban areas in search of employment or to engage in daily wage labour. As the term implies, daily wage labour is not regular, consistent employment. Rather, men will go out each day in search of unskilled work-- construction, agricultural labour-- and women will often go for household labour. And if someone works one day, there is no guarantee that he/she will work the next. Aside from being an inconsistent and unreliable form of income, daily wage labour also pays significantly less than a regular job would. Just like many workers in America have to settle for negligible pay because there are people in other countries who are willing to do the same work for much less, wage labourers in Kerala must settle for this lousy pay because there is a constant stream of people from Tamil Nadu and other neighboring states who will do these jobs for much less.

In the dalit colony Pradeep and I have been visiting, there are members of three different castes-- the ulaadas, pulayas, and paraiyars (interesting note-- it is from this caste name that the word pariah has its origin). I am unclear as to which is which, but traditionally these castes were basket-weavers, tree cutters, and rat catchers. Those who were tree cutters can no longer find work in their traditional profession because there is a glut of labour in the lumber industry. Because it pays reasonably well, rural people from all castes have flocked to tree-cutting for their wages. Also, as large companies with technology more advanced than an axe and rope take over the lumber industry, the traditional labourers are foced out of their profession and are having to turn to daily wage labour to make a living. Similarly, those who used to make their living by weaving and selling reed baskets no longer have a market because of the influx of higher quality plastic products and they, likewise, are forced to do wage or household labour in order to survive. For the rat catchers, whose job it was to rid their employers' paddy fields of vermin, the stigma and indignity (is that even a word??) associated with the job led many people to voluntarily eschew their traditional profession while modern pesticides and pest-control practices drove the rest out of their jobs (this, to say nothing of the environmental issues surrounding this).

Nearly every person we have spoken to thus far in the colony goes for daily wage labour. Only one out of the maybe 50 people we have talked to has a regular salaried job with benefits. This man, Sureshan, has a reservation job working in the canteen of Travancore/Cochin Chemicals. And while he has a regular job, a well-maintained house, and a reasonably comfortable life, he still can not move out of this colony where at least four homes are crowded onto every ten cents (100 cents= 1 acre) of land and there is no infrastructure for indoor plumbing. While there is no official or structural bar to upward mobility for dalits, the attitude and mentality of people in the mainstream keeps them on the margins of society. News reports are replete with stories of violence against dalits who do not stay in their place or who dare to step outside the normative roles proscribed upon them. Dalits are punished-- beaten, murdered, their wives and daughters raped, their homes destroyed, their water (yes, in many places they have a specifically dalit water tank) poisoned-- for infringements as dire as drawing water from the public tap. There are laws and acts in place specifically to protect dalits from caste violence. But when invoked, the cases are rarely followed through, especially when, as is often the case, the perpetrators are influential members of upper caste families. However, when dalit frustration boils over into protest or violence, they are quickly and efficiently dealt with by the law.

I've tried to cram a lot into this post... I hope it makes sense and is at least a little edifying. I will write more as my understanding (hopefully) grows with subsequent visits to the colony. There is a lot related to the "dalit issue," such as land reform and the role of religion in their struggle for dignity and development, that I haven't even touched on here. Hopefully I'll be able to write about these things in the future. But I think this is quite enough for now.

2007-02-27T09:10:00.000+03:00

Cast of Thousands

I realize how negative that last post might have sounded. Which is OK, because I've been having a pretty tough time and feeling pretty negative for the last month and change. But in a sincere effort to allow my readers to approach the "truth" of my situation here, I'll make a deliberate effort in these next few posts to write about some of the positive aspects of my experience rather than just crapping on India and myself.

Even though, as mentioned in my last post and evidenced in the last 26 years of my life, I am an intensely private, independent person and it has always been a challenge for me to open myself to other people, there are a number of people who have deeply impacted my experiences in India so far and I, taking a cue from Cat, who is much better at this whole blogging thing than I, would like to introduce some of them to you here.

Thomas John Achen and Betty Kochamma-- the yin and yang of the South India YAV program. Achen is the head and voice of the program, Kochamma, the hands and heart. Together they are as wonderful a surrogate family as anyone could ask for. As busy as they are, they are always willing to feed, listen to, give advice to, and be a sanctuary for us.

Phillip Koshy-- One of the residents of Chacko Homes, Phillip is totally off his rocker and I love him for it. I can always count on him for an unintended dose of perspective. Phillip is the king of the world he has built in his head-- at least once a day he is offered the presidency or kingship of some country or the other, and, as of the latest tally, he has been given the Nobel Prize 8 times since September. He often talks about his wife and daughter who are living in the States (don't tell Dick Cheney, but Phillip's wife is actually the vice-President of the US). And I often wonder if they're real at all. How much of his life is real and how much is entirely in his head? But how much of any of our lives is "real," and how much of it do we construct in our imaginations to create relevance and meaning for ourselves? Phillip may never know it but he has probably been my most valuable interlocutor in this ontological quest for understanding... or for the knowledge that I don't understand jack squat. But the most valuable thing I get from Phillip is that, real or not, he is really happy in the world he inhabits.

Johnappa and Gopalan-- affectionately dubbed (by me) Those Two Crazy Guys at UC College, Johnappa and Gopalan are research fellows working under the auspices of the English Department, and are probably the most interesting people at the college. When I first met them, they were researching the ancient yogic practice of alchemy in the creation of medicinal herbs and the practices of yogis who still live alone in caves up in the mountains which apparently allow them to live, if not eternally, then well beyond the normal span of days. Recent visits to their shared office have yielded discussions about ancient temples and lost treasure in the jungles of Kerala, pygmy elephants, yogic meditation, hydrogeology, lost tribes in the Andaman Islands that have never had contact with modern society, and Benny Hinn. Whenever life gets mundane, I know I can visit Johnappa and Gopalan and hear about something that will renew my sense of wonder. As of right now, we are tentatively planning to spend the end of March or the beginning of April tramping through the jungle in order to document the aforementioned lost temple. I also have plans to spend a week with Gopalan's guru in a cave up in the mountains, learning yoga and meditation. I get the feeling that some of the best stories about my year in India are going to come from rolling with these guys.

Dr. Prabu Ramachandran-- a new resident of Chacko Homes, Prabu is a proper early-20th-century English gentleman painted brown and dropped into 21st Century India. Given an entirely English education in pre-Independence India, he feels completely out of step with his countrymen and is almost as uncomfortable with Malayalam as I am. As gregarious and outgoing as anyone can be, Prabu is always ready with a witty anecdote or bawdy joke, and his old-fashioned Anglophilia is like a trip back to a time and place I never knew.

Pradeep Joseph-- I have to laugh at Pradeep because I see a lot of myself in his Quixotic efforts to do EVERYTHING. And in his efforts to do everything, he accomplishes almost nothing. I can really relate. I first got to know Pradeep in his position as Secretary of the Student Christian Fellowship. As one of the student leaders of the group, he shared my enthusiasm for mission and outreach and agreed that the SCF should be leading the College in meaningful engagement with social issues. As seems typical of India though, that enthusiasm has yet to translate into any sort of action. In the meantime, though, he has published his memoirs. Why? I don't know. But I got an autographed copy. He is now planning to make a "campus film," a fictitious documentary about the loss of open space in the campus and the decline of student debate and discussion due to the lack of a physical forum. Additionally he is writing a dissertation on the status of widows in harijan (dalit) communities. As he is currently conducting interviews in the nearby dalit colonies, I have invited myself to go around with him as a way of finally being able to interact with and gather stories from the dalit people. (I intend to do a post just on what it means to be a dalit soon, so that this word i keep using will have some meaning for you all).

There are plenty of others, but these are just a few of the folks who jump readily to mind, that have been making my experiences in India so far meaningful and memorable.

2007-02-26T08:59:00.000+03:00

Half-Year Reflections

February 14th (yes, I realize that was almost 2 weeks ago at this point... I was out of the country; give me a break) marked the halfway point of my year of service in India. This year has challenged me and my expectations at just about every turn so far, and this halfway point seems as good a time as any to look at the experiences I've had so far and the things that I've learned.

About a year ago when I was applying for this program, at the placement event in April when I found out I would be coming to India, at our orientation in August, and even for the first few weeks here, I had a pretty clear idea of what International Mission Service meant, and how I was particularly equipped to engage in it. My year, I imagined, would be spent cross-legged on the dirt floors of the homes of the marginalized in Indian society. I would listen to their stories (told, of course, in intelligible, if quaintly idiomatic, English. Either that or I would have a good enough working knowledge of Malayalam to understand their stories in their own tongue). I would create a blog to share the stories of these voiceless people, and write songs addressing the overarching social issues that perpetuate poverty and caste stratification and deprivation. My work at UC College would be a point of entry to engage these issues and to engage young Christians (and Hindus and Muslims and Buddhists) in discussion about responses and responsibilities to these issues; to cultivate awareness and a desire and feeling of responsibility to change oppressive, unjust structures of oppression, violence, and deprivation.

Thus far I have done precisely none of these things.

Before I came here, my mom's cousin asked what I was expecting this year to be like. I gave what I thought was the "correct" answer and said that I was trying not to have any expectations. I only wanted to stay open, receptive, and responsive to the reality of my situation and to the experiences I would have and the lessons I would learn in and from India. Once I settled into life here, however, I realized just how many expectations I had been secretly harbouring. Mostly I recognized this by how many of them were utterly dashed. I'm living in a retirement home for rich old folks, and working at a College whose population is ostentationsly upper-middle class with no interest in social justice. Rather than engaging the students in discourse addressing social issues, the college has made use of me teaching English, helping to publish its newsletter, and researching and writing a history of the institution. The teaching has been cool. I like teaching, am good at it, and have become reasonably sure that it is the vocation I am being called to. Sadly, however, I have not been used in this capacity nearly as much as I would have liked. Aside from mid-November to mid-December when I was teaching an average of two classes a day, I've only been teaching two or three classes a week. And since the end of December, when exams began, I've been doing even less than that.

I spend most of the workday at the computer in the library uploading pictures, composing intermittent blog posts, and writing e-mails to friends and family. I also take tea approximately 8 times a day. After my "work" at the college is finished, I run, read, and meditate until bed. I've barely done any work on the history of the college and the Journalism Club, with whom I would create a quarterly newsletter, has yet to materialize.

I have attempted to insinuate myself into life here in various ways, but never successfully. I used to spend time with the Student Christian Fellowship. All that means is that I used to attend their meetings. Once in a while I would teach a song, and occasionally I would deliver a message stressing the idea that to be a Christian means to emulate the life of Christ and to confront the injustice that we see in the world. I spend time on Saturdays with Share Light, a group of college students who work with local dalit children, helping them with homework, playing with them, and providing a forum for them to share their talents. The kids only speak Malayalam. I don't. I can't help them in any way, and the college students want me to be a resource for Western methods of teaching and education. I share my thoughts with them, but I don't think apeing Western education will solve the problems they are trying to address. The kids like it when I bring my camera and take pictures of them, and they like the movements to the Fishy Song ("Have you ever seen a fishy on a hot summer day?"). So I guess that's something. I will sometimes spend an afternoon visiting homes in the nearby dalit colony, but there's no real relationship there. Again, language is the biggest barrier as few of the people there speak any English, and my Malayalam does not go much beyond "What is your name? My name is Andrew. How are you?". Mostly I drink a lot of tea and smile and nod a lot.

As you can probably tell, I'm pretty disappointed with myself. I've been told that the blame lies both with me and with the college. Yes, it would be nice if I was more outgoing and more willing and able to form informal friendly relationships. But acknowledging that I'm not, the college should take measures to facilitate my entry into life here. They haven't, and they won't. Yes, I should try to be a presence in the poor community outside the college, but understanding the language barrier and my own social dysfunctions, the college should have a formal outreach structure that would involve students as well as me. They don't, and they're not going to.

Anytime it seems that I'm being extremely pessimistic or self-denigrating, bear in mind that that's never all I'm doing. When things piss me off or when I'm doubting myself or struggling with something, I always see it as an opportunity for self-reflection and growth. And that is mostly what I think I've gotten out of this year so far.

I've had to completely let go of my ideas about what it means to be a missionary; what it means to serve God and to trust that he knows what he's doing, even when we don't. We don't get much control over the situations that we find ourselves in. All we can do is the best we can with what we're given. Of course we can change our circumstances up to a point. But there are always things we can't control and situations, no matter how carefully laid out, will never be exactly the way we've planned. To live a Christian life is not to serve God the way we want to or the way we think we ought to. It is to allow God to work through us in whatever circumstances we find ourselves. So I'm not able to minister directly to the poor and marginalized. So I'm not able to form close relationships with people from an entirely different culture (hell, it's hard enough for me to form relationships with people in my hometown...). This doesn't mean that I'm a failure or that my year is a waste of time and money. The good that I intend to do never gets done. But I'm sure I'm doing plenty of good I never meant to. And that's the best kind of good.

While I may not be able to say what good I'm doing for people here or at home, I know that I'm growing significantly as a result of the challenges, doubts, and frustrations I face. Like I said, anything that irritates or frustrates me is an opportunity for growth and there is always a lesson that can be learned from these things. I've written about some of these lessons at length before, so I won't reiterate them here. My self-reliance and independence are taking a very inconvenient shape here and are significantly hindering my entrance into meaningful relationships. I would never have to examine these traits in the US where they are considered the ideal. As it is, though, I have to dig at these characteristics and try to lay bare their roots so that I can get past them and open myself to others. It is unlikely that this will be done in another 5 months, but this is an important work of self-examination that would never have been started otherwise.

I've begun (and have found that I really enjoy) reading the Bible. The Old Testament is full of great stories and fascinating anthropology and ethnology. The Gospels lay out the kind of life we're called to lead, and the Acts show how humans struggle to lead this life. The Psalms cover the entire spectrum of human emotion, and the Epistles are full of great advice, from one person to another.

The time that I take for myself, running and meditating, are probably the most valuable times and my favourite times of the day. They allow me to be alone and silent and still and to "just be." The idea behind our Ministry of Presence here is that we are supposed to "just be" with the community. But I think it's just as important to just be with ourselves as well, and this is often overlooked.

And probably the most important part of my year so far: I eat Arrowroot (son of Arrowshirt) biscuits. That's a little esoteric Bored of the Rings humour that only my dad, brother, and, by osmosis, mom will get.

2007-02-09T08:16:00.000+03:00

Dispassionate Analysis

OK, I've vented about my discomfort with our travels through Andhra, so now I'll try to be a bit more objective and talk about what we learned.

Yes, there is definitely valuable, important, and worthwhile work going on in the villages we visited, and that's the important thing.

In a village where handloom weaving is the major economic activity, lack of a market and falling prices where there is one, are driving people to unemployment and poverty. The Indian marketplace is flooded by high quality, cheap fabrics from overseas. No one in India wants to buy the coarse handloomed Indian fabric anymore. People here totally buy into the idea that anything produced outside India is better than that which is produced indigenously. In order to encourage production and consumption of handloomed fabric, the government has subsidized thread for producers and offers hefty discounts to consumers. But the subsidies only reach a handful of producers, and the discounts translate to lower profits. Furthermore, producers do not have direct access to the market-- they have to go through intermediaries and retailers who take most of the money from the sales. So for a sari that costs the consumer Rs 500/-, the producer will get less than half of that. And because handloom weaving is all that people in these villages have done for time out of mind, it's not like they have any other skills to fall back on to find other means of income generation. Chethana has been working in these villages to help acquire cheap materials and have also been helping the producers in these villages reach a market for their goods as well as providing education and training in other marketable skills.

We also visited several tribal villages to learn about the issues they face and what is being done to help. Land and water issues and education were the recurrent themes here. Land is often granted to tribal peoples by the government, but they never own this land and are thus often forcibly removed from it when the government decides to use it for industry or commerce. And even if they get land, there is no housing initiative. So many people in these villages do not have adequate or permanent housing. These villages are often without an effective drainage system, so during the rainy season the entire village is often flooded and the people have to relocate elsewhere, to even more temporary housing. Also, due to the flooding, illness is rampant during the rainy months and there is no accessible hospital. Farming is the najor economic activity in these villages, but because of the dry climate and lack of rain this activity is not a reliable source of income (last year, most farmers worked fewer than 90 days). Bereft of their only source of income and completely uneducated, the men will either move to the cities to take demeaning jobs (tribals are severely looked down upon by "civilized" society) or will become tenant farmers where the majority of crops and money they raise go to the landlord. Similarly to the handloom weavers, most of the people in these villages are totally uneducated and there are no nearby schools. In these areas, BIRDS has been doing a lot of great work. Mainly, they focus on empowering the people-- educating them about their rights and teaching them how to stand up and approach the government to claim these rights. Also, in a huuuuge compound central to several small, isolated villages, BIRDS has set up a hospital with a full-time doctor and an ambulance to provide medical care to those who would otherwise have no access to it. They also have what they call an orphanage (although it doesn't really sound like an orphanage the way we understand it) where kids stay during the school year and get bussed to and from the nearest school. They also conduct training programmes and provide education for women from the villages and educate farmers in alternative, sustainable farming practices. Additionally, all the workers in the compound are hired from these villages.

That's some of what is going on. Hope it helps.

2007-02-07T08:15:00.000+03:00

January Retreat-- Andhra Pradesh

Well I'm finally back in Alwaye, for better or worse. I spent the last two weeks traveling Andhra Pradesh with the other volunteers and visiting Alicia in Bangalore.

Pretty much the entire month of January was really tough-- I was feeling lonely, alienated, frustrated, and overly critical of myself. It's hard being completely alone; being constantly on display in a place where everyone wants to get to know you but no one can possibly understand you. It's exhausting trying to live up to so many different sets of expectations that are all at odds with one another-- Achen has one set of expectations for me, the college has another, and I have completely different ones. And disappointing people by failing to live up to these expectations invariably causes me to judge myself very harshly. Not a good scene.

So it's always extremely comforting when I get on a train with the other YAVs and hear them talking about their own struggles which so closely mirror my own. It's a nice reminder that I'm not alone. I'm not the only one going through this shit. And it means that there's not something wrong with me. Our retreats are a very valuable time for all of us. I think we would all have whacked out months ago if not for the monthly opportunity to spend time with people who very intimately understand what we're going through and can relate to our feelings and struggles.

But our retreats are never "retreats" in the sense of fleeing from the field of battle. They are calculated exposure programmes that are designed to bring us into closer contact and educate us about the social issues facing different parts of India (since none of us get that at our placements). So from the 24th-31st of January, we traveled all around the state of Andhra Pradesh with a group from the Sacramento Presbytery who are part of the Presbyterian Hunger Program's Joining Hands Against Hunger program. They were pretty cool people, and it was nice to be around other Americans. It was also funny to be around them and to get to have some template against which to see how "Indian" we've become. It was also nice to travel with them because it was obvious that they were being wooed by Chethana for more money, and thus we were being put up in some extremely luxurious hotels with air conditioning, TV, hot showers, swimming pools (never mind that they weren't filled), and room service, and being treated to gorgeous meals with complimentary wine and beer.

But this was also the cause of some discomfort for me. The whole thing smacked of a Chethana (and more specifically, a BIRDS) sales pitch. Chethana, the South Indian branch of Joining Hands Against Hunger, is a blanket organization that provides funding and support for the 19 organizations that fall under it. Achen is one of Chethana's chairpersons, along with Paul Rajarao and a dude named Jacob. Paul and Jacob are also the heads of BIRDS (Bharati Integrated Rural Development Society), one of the organizations in Chethana. So there's a bit of vested interest there. And it was they who were leading this programme and treating us to all these lavish luxuries.

During the day, we would visit different villages learning about the evil MNC's and corrupt governments depriving these noble poor people of land and livelihoods and then we'd hear about the heroic efforts of BIRDS to restore their dignity and teach them to fight for their rights. And then we'd get back in ou air conditioned SUV's and go back to our air conditioned hotels and eat until we couldn't see anymore, take a hot shower, and go to sleep in our big, soft beds.

Maybe I'm just feeling antagonistic, but something about the whole thing didn't, and still doesn't sit right with me. Maybe it's the fact that the struggles of the poor and oppressed are being put on display and being strategically deployed to raise money for these organizations. But when I think about it, is there really anything wrong with that? Chethana and BIRDS are doing some really great work, and surely they deserve support to keep that work going. And so what if Paul seems like a fast talking, charming salesman-- the kind of guy who would be selling you a used Chevy in another life? If those are the gifts he's been given, what's wrong with him using them to do this good work?

Maybe I'm just overly critical of others because I'm again at a point where I'm doubting the value of my work and presence here. Maybe it's that I think we should keep our left hand from knowing what our right is doing when we are serving and this all seemed a little ostentatious and self-aggrandizing to me. Maybe I'm just a crank who needs to find fault with everything. I don't know.

Regardless, something about our travels in AP just didn't sit right with me. I'm grateful for all the things we learned and for the opportunity to interact with people who are working to address the systemic inequalities and injustices endemic here. I just feel like there could have been a more... I don't know, genuine... way to do it.

2007-01-24T12:53:00.000+03:00

Again...

My writing habits are kind of funny. I've gone months (eventful and thoughtful months, mind you) without really writing anything of substance, only occasionally cobbling together a post out of some sense of loyalty to whatever readers I may have. Hi, mom.

But as my old gaffer says, it never rains but it pours. OK, maybe I'm taking the Sam Gamgee metaphor a little far. I've never referred to my father as the gaffer (although... if i ever *deep breath* have kids *ok, I can breathe again*, they will definitely be encouraged to call their paternal grandfather The Gaffer. Consider yourself warned, Dad), and the only piece of axiomatic advice he ever gave me was regarding the fairer sex and is not suitable to recounted here. Regardless. Now I find myself nigh overwhelmed by a deluge of ideas of diluvian proportions.

And of course I leave tomorrow morning for a week-long trip to Andhra Pradesh. I'll do my best to get everything I want to written down, and hopefully be able to post some of it when I get back.

Long story short, there are some posts on the way. Continue to bear with me...

2007-01-03T09:45:00.000+03:00

On Meditation

In light of our yoga and meditation retreat, I'm going to try and compile and condense some of the writing I've done on meditation practice into something comprehensible here. I've written pretty extensively on the topic, but have kept it largely to myself until now.

My practice of meditation has repeatedly come under fire as being irresponsible and aloof, and so I've done a good amount of writing trying to explain why I do it and what positive effects it has for the larger world, as I maintain it does. And of course, feeling like you have to justify your meditation practice because other people do not understand it is entirely anathema to the whole thing, I know. But the fact is that I practice meditation to be a better Christian and to be a more effective vehicle for living out the values of the Kingdom, and to work more effectively to create a better world. So I can not tolerate having this called "irresponsible" or "convenient," and so feel a necessity to clarify and explain for the sake of those who do not understand. If that shows a lack of understanding and maturity of practice on my part, I remind my readers that I am still just a toddler on this path.

A couple of months ago, I did a bit of a lexical study to explain meditation a bit. In the circles I associate with, we talk about Mindfulness Training ,and Meditation Practice. I think the words "training" and "practice" can go a long way toward explaining meditation.

Anything we do to deliberately cultivate mindfulness is considered Practice, and the implications of the word are pretty deep.

What does it mean to practice something? And why do we practice? When we practice something, we devote a lot of attention and effort to it so that, in time, we can do it effortlessly without having to think about it. Something we practice a lot becomes completely natural.

When I practice the guitar, I drill different scales and modes so that, when I have to, I can recall and play them accurately to complement a certain song or express a certain feeling. I do exercises to improve the speed, strength, accuracy, and dexterity of my hands and fingers to make my playing easier, more accurate, and more expressive. And, as every teenager knows, I practice alone in my bedroom so that I can one day rock Giants Stadium.

When we go to track practice, we do drills to improve our form so that our running is more biomechanically efficient and we can run faster and easier. Different workouts serve to increase muscle strength, flexibility, lactate threshold, cardiovascular and aerobic health, all of which will make our running more effortless. And again, I run alone around Lake Telemark and UC College so that I can eventualy win the New York Marathon.

In these examples, we practice by devoting very concentrated attention and effort to an activity so that we can be "better" at it; so that it becomes an effortless second nature. When my band has a performance or when I run a race, I do not have to worry about what my hands or legs are doing. I can enjoy the experience and know that my practice has prepared me for the performance. And in these examples, we practice in insular conditions so that our abilities can develop strong roots, and will be there when we need them in higher-pressure situations.

These analyses hold true for meditation practice too. When we meditate, we are practicing mindfulness (according to Thich Nhat Hanh, the world's foremost teacher of mindfulness, "keeping one's consciousness alive to the present reality"). We practice being aware of the reality of the present moment; we practice deeply seeing and understanding any situation, thought, or feeling that may arise. And like any other kind of practice, we devote concentrated time, effort, and attention to deeply experiencing and understanding reality so that, in time, we can do it without effort or conscious thought. We strengthen our mindfulness through sitting or walking meditation so that it can become something we are in touch with all the time, in all situations and circumstances.

And when we live our lives with mindfulness, we can't help but be loving, compassionate, and peaceful. And that DOES have a positive impact on the world. No matter what we do-- whether we are a teacher or activist-, we need the skill of mindfulness to "be alert and ready to handle ably and intelligently any situation that may arise... [A] calm heart and self-control are necessary if one is to obtain good results... If we are not in control of ourselves but instead let our impatience or anger interfere, then our work is no longer of any value" (Nhat Hanh, The Miracle of Mindfulness). Without mindfulness and its attendant love, compassion, and deep understanding, it is possible to obtain good results. But they would be incidental. It is much more likely that any action we undertake without real mindfulness will do more harm than good. It is only by being deeply in touch with the reality of a situation and acting out of love, compassion, and peace that we can create any positive, lasting change. And to cultivate our mindfulness, we need to practice.

As we meditate, we become aware of the constant monologue of our thoughts; an ongoing commentary on our past, present, and future. We learn to acknowledge these thoughts, identify them as what they are, and allow them to pass away without clinging.

Even more importantly, we become aware of the silence and stillness in the small spaces between thoughts. It is in these silences, these spaces, that we encounter reality, and we learn to cultivate this stillness and enter into it as a space of no fear, no desire. It's a place of just being, where we relate to the world as it really is, with no ego-centred analysis or commentary. Just equanimity and a direct experience of life; which is, I think, a direct experience of God.

In fact, it seems to me that the essence of any authentic Religious Practice is that of getting ourselves (our Selves) out of the way-- the extinction of the Self and the Ego to allow for true union or communion with the Universal, or God, or Whatever. Which only makes sense, since this is our true nature anyway.

The practice of meditation-- the learning to let go of our narrative and commentary and really dwell in the stillness and silence-- teaches us to get our Selves out of the way. Our thoughts are constantly commenting on, interpreting, and analyzing the present, and also building a past based on highly mediated, selective memories. In short, we are constantly involved in the process of constructing a Story of Me. And most of us relate to this story-- our memories, perceptions, and commentaries-- rather than to the reality of any given situation.

The more room We take up, the less room there is for God. When we can silence our commentary, stop relating to our Story, and get our Selves out of the way, we allow more space for God to work in and through us, and that, I think, can only be a good thing.

I'll try to write more in-depth and articulately on this subject in the future; but for now, I tihnk this is quite enough to swallow as an introduction.....

2007-01-03T09:18:00.000+03:00

New Year's Resolutions

I've never been a particularly great proponent of the whole New Year's Resolution thing. Why make a big ritual out of making promises that you know you're going to break? Calling something a New Year's Resolution is basically a kiss of death. If there's a change that needs to be made in your life, then make the damn change! You don't need to announce it and then doom it to failure by couching it as a NYR.

That being said, I have set one goal for myself for 2007. And only one. I could resolve to get more involved in life here or to make sure I engage in some truly meaningful activity for the rest of my time in Kerala, or build some meaningful, lasting relationships. But I'm not going to do that, since there is a lot involved in those promises that I simply have no control over.

I will, however, run every day of 2007. No matter how busy I am, no matter what the weather is like, no matter how i'm feeling physically or mentally, I will run, in some way, shape, or form, every day of this year. I'm not saying that I'm going to run for an hour every day or X miles every day. But I will run at least a little bit every day, even if it's just 10 minutes of the Survival Shuffle. And I'll still try to get two or three quality sessions in each week in addition to my weekend long run. All this goes towards my goal of running a 10K when I get back to the States, and then a marathon in November. It's also a way of making sure that I do something good for myself every day.

I'm off to a good start. Even though I was on a bus all day on the 1st, I ran for a bit when I got back to Aluva at night, and yesterday I managed to get 20 minutes in even though I was otherwise bedridden with vomiting and "loose motion." I think our three week long All-India tour in April will be my biggest challenge, but I have some time before I have to deal with that.

2007-01-03T08:09:00.000+03:00

Yoga Retreat
(26 December 2006- 1 January 2007)

Merry Christmas, Happy New Year, and anything else I may have missed in this most recent lapse in posting!

Disclaimer: I'm really sick and pretty out of it right now, so I hope this ends up being coherent. If not, you know why.

I just got back from our most recent excursion into the fabled world beyond UC College. From the 26th of December until the 1st of January, the volunteers, along with two of Kyle's friends from Washington, were in Idukki for yoga and meditation training. So after spending Christmas Eve and Day with Achen and his family, we got on a bus and headed for the mountains. As our most competent navigator, Kyle was in charge of the directions and sat right next to the driver, asking "Double Cutting?" at every stop. Eventually the driver said that we were about 4km from Double Cutting. About 45 minutes later, Kyle asked him again, "Double Cutting?" From the series of gestures the driver made, we gathered that he had blown right through Double Cutting 8km ago without bothering to tell us. So we got down at the next stop and had to catch a bus back to Double Cutting. From there we hired a jeep to take us to the yoga centre at the top of the mountain. The dirt road up the mountain dove and climbed and nearly bucked us out of the jeep several times. And there were times we were sure we would die. However, we eventually made it to Arsha Yoga Gurukulam.

Situated in a cleft of the Western Ghats between two higher peaks, Arsha Yoga Gurukulam commands a spectacular view of Idukki Lake and the Idukki wildlife sanctuary several hundred feet below. It was quiet, peaceful, and isolated-- the perfect place for a meditative getaway. A few years ago, Harilal, the founder and owner of the ashram, bought a small piece of land and gradually acquired more until he owned 7 acres. He built the road leading up to the ashram and arranged for running water and electricity, and he built the four mud-brick and thatch buildings that comprise the gurukulam-- his home, two huts for guests, and the yoga/meditation hall. He has begun some projects in organic farming on the land, and has plans to expand the facilities. But as far as I could gather, we were either his first or second group of paying guests. Harilal splits his year between Germany and India, and while he's in India, it sounds like he spends most of his time traveling to different places to teach, so he doesn't really spend much time at the gurukulam. His disciple, Sudarsh, however, spends significantly more time at the gurukulam. I was absolutely in love with this place and offered my services as resident caretaker for the duration of my time in Kerala. I don't think they thought I was being serious.

Arsha Yoga Gurukulam really was my ideal place, though. Like I said, it was quiet, peaceful, isolated, beautiful and surrounded by pristine nature. Life there is simple, disciplined, and contemplative. When we first walked to the top of the hill to take in the view, I plopped myself down on a large flat rock on the cliff with a huge stupid smile on my face and someone joked "This place was made for you." And I definitely felt more in my element than I have at any other point during my stay in India.

Our five days at Arsha Yoga were beautiful and passed much too quickly for my liking. The day started at 7 with Pranayama (breathing exercises) and meditation, followed by tea around 7:45. We would then practice yoga for about two hours and have brunch around 10. The food was simple and vegetarian, and very good. Everywhere we go, we develop a reputation as a group who loves to eat. A lot. Within twelve hours of our arrival, Harilal knew that any excess food could be unloaded onto my or Kyle's plate with only superficial protest. After brunch, we had the option to engage in Karma Yoga, or selfless service (read: being put to work around the ashram) for a couple of hours. So we helped to clear the road and clean the retaining wall leading up to Harilal's hut. We reconstructed a portion of the path leading up to the yoga hut, and moved a large lamp post to a more amenable spot. After our Karma Yoga was more tea, and then we were pretty much free for the afternoon.

One afternoon, we hiked down the mountain to the lake and swam for a while, had tea down there and hiked back up. Another day, Mike, Kyle, and I accompanied Harilal into the village to help him lead a yoga workshop for plus-two (high school senior) students. The other days, I used the afternoons to do some running on the brutal inclines up to the surrounding peaks.

At 4 we would reconvene for another two hours of asana practice, followed by dinner. And we would end the day with more meditation and a teaching by Harilal on Ashtanga (the eight limbs of yoga).

After the yoga retreat, our descent to Kumily (a huuuuge European tourist destination) for New Year's Eve, and my return to Aluva have been disruptive and pretty depressing. But that's the trouble with living a secluded life of contemplation, I guess. You eventually have to return to the Real World. I hope, though, that my experiences of the past week have taught me to keep the peace and balance of mind gained through yoga and meditation practice even in the midst of the hustle and bustle of daily life.

2006-12-18T08:31:00.000+03:00

I'd like to amend some of my earlier unkind comments about the CSI choir. I won't delete them because I want this blog to be an honest record of my experiences and feelings, and that sort of revisionist editing would undercut the whole endeavour. But I can offer a more positive perspective now that is equally true.

The Holy Trinity CSI church had its Christmas carol service on Saturday, and I was very pleasantly surprised by the choir. We really pulled it together over the course of the last week, and sounded very good on Saturday. And I even actually had fun singing with them. Never saw that coming. Musical ability aside, the choir is a great group of people who sing for all the right reasons and who definitely do they best they can with what they've got. and I certainly can't fault them for that. They're all very happy singing in the choir-- I was the one who had a problem and was being overly-critical.

As much as I bitched and moaned about having to practice every single night for the past two months, I'm kind of bummed now that choir season is winding down. Singing in all these choirs was a very positive experience and was an opportunity to get to know people I probably wouldn't have otherwise and was a great way to get familiar with a new language.

So consider this my apology to the choir. It's still not very well run or organized, but that's ok. It doesn't have to be. I'm sure it doesn't bother God in the least, and it shouldn't bother me either.

2006-12-12T09:56:00.000+03:00

Fashion Disasters

Just before the college carol service on Sunday, as the choir was milling around outside the chapel waiting for the chords that would signal us to start marching down the aisle, two of my friends, Beena and Pretty (yes, that's really her name...), came over to me, grabbed my arm and whispered urgently, "Andy, we have to talk to you."

From the way they said it, I was guessing that an attempt was going to be made on my life, so I followed them with equal urgency. They led me about ten meters away from the larger group and said in hushed voices laden with gravity "You need to tuck in your shirt."

So I laughed and tucked in my shirt.

I laughed, not because of the fact that an untucked shirt was a matter of life and death, nor because they were so interested in preserving my dignity and showing the proper respect to a teacher and Westerner that they felt the need to inform me of this in private. I laughed because this is the third time I have been sternly reprimanded for my gross impropriety of dress and appearance.

For a country where most homes don't even have indoor plumbing and deodorant is completely unfamiliar, India is positively obsessed with appearances and vanity.

There are very strict codes of what is considered appropriate with regard to one's appearance. And I am daily at variance with these codes. Normally, people are willing to overlook it because I am a foreigner. But when my breaches of propriety impinge upon someone else's image, you better believe I hear about it!

The first talking-to I got was from a fellow named P.T. (not to be confused with P.I., from the last post) John at Chacko Homes. After lunch one day, John rang my doorbell and said, with the same sense of quiet, earnest urgency I heard from the girls on Sunday, "Andrew, I need to talk to you about something." I had been wearing a plain white T-shirt around that day, and apparently this is entirely unacceptable. White T-shirts are considered underwear and are not to be worn in public. This is the equivalent of showing up for dinner in your tighty whities (which is pretty high on my list of things to do, actually).

The second time my appearance became a problem was when a friend invited me to visit his family's home in the Idukki district one weekend. When he showed up on Saturday morning to collect me, he looked at me with dismay and said, "Oh no, this is very bad. I can not take you like this." I was confused. I looked exactly the same as I do every day-- khakis, button-down shirt, hair fairly neatly combed (I know, I can't believe I dress like this every day either...), so I didn't see what the problem was. But my shirt wasn't tucked in, I didn't have a belt. And worst of all was my scruffy beard. Americans in magazines, he said, are all precisely dressed, clean-shaven, and have perfect coifs.

Indians, especially Indian males age 17-23, worship all thingsAmerican and do their best to model themselves after Leonardo DiCaprio circa Titanic, the Backstreet Boys, and male models in magazines.

I am problematic because I meet precisely none of these standards. He didn't want his family to meet Andy the Missionary-- he wanted an American Ken doll to show off. Which sort of makes sense. In a place as anglophilic as Kerala, having a white American friend to show off is a tremendous status symbol, and is sure to bump up your coolness and respectbility quotient a few notches.

So on sunday, I tucked in my shirt and I don't wear white T-shirts around anymore. But my hairline is not conducive to a coif, and I like my pubescent beard so I'm going to keep it, thank you very much. I'll accomodate India to a certain extent. But like my brother says, yeah, I'm here to absorb all of India I can. But I'm also here to give India the Andy Smith Experience. So I've got to stay true to who I am.

2006-12-11T08:09:00.000+03:00

Christmastime, Indian Style

Ellavarkum Christmasinte mangalangal! Christmas greetings to you all!

While you would never know it from the weather, it's Christmastime in India (why does that sound like a Weird Al song to me?). I'm pretty sure there won't be any white (except for me!) involved in Christmas here, and I have yet to see an actual pine tree. But there are stars being hung in front of every house, Christmas lights are even going up in places, and Christmas songs are being sung as Keralites prepare to celebrate the birth of Jesus. The only place in India that has a reasonably high Christian population (I've heard estimates everywhere between 20-40%), Kerala is a fascinating place to celebrate Christmas, because people of all different faiths get into the celebrations. And I've gotten to partake in some of the festivities.

I should preface this by explaining that I've been singing in three different choirs for the Christmas season-- the UC College Christmas choir, the Holy Trinity CSI choir, and the YMCA Ecumenical choir. Between them, I've had at least one choir practice every day of every week for the past two months (yes, they all started preparing for Christmas in October-- that's early even by my standards!). I love singing in the college choir-- it's well organized and well directed by Thomas Phillip (TP Saar), who really knows music and is a great teacher. Plus, it's made up of a wonderful group of students and faculty who I love spending time with and getting to know.

Not quite so well organized is the Ecumenical choir, whose practices are rarely announced in advance (three times last week, Santhosh, the most competent director of this choir [there are a few different guys who seem to be vying for control], came to knock on my door while I was in varying states of undress and repose during my few unspoken-for hours, to say "hey, we're practicing now if you can join us."), and which really has no clear cut leader- or director-ship. Practices are sparsely attended at best, but at least most of the people in the choir can sing pretty well and know music in at least some nominal sense.

The CSI choir, however, is a disaster. Practices are reasonably predictable and regular, but are still laxly attended. Which is a travesty because there are many members who can not carry a tune, much less read music, harmonise or blend with other parts. And the director is, frankly, awful. I've been blessed to work with some really talented musical directors in the past-- Dick Eckstein, Sal and Bonnie, Sara from Starving Artists--, so I might not be in a fair place to judge. But this guy doesn't seem to realize that parts generally need to be taught before a performance, and that it's usually NOT a good idea to spring a new piece of music on a choir in the penultimate practice before a Christmas service. And it can't help that he's a blowhard who just likes to hear himself talk and sing, even though he can't sing a note, and I'm pretty sure he's never looked at a sheet of notation in his life. So we have sheaves of songs that have never been taught, that we're still expected to sing in less than a week; half of which are in a language that I can't understand, and use scales, modes, and rhythms completely unfamiliar to me. Good thing we've sung through these songs all of once, and that in unison on the melody.

And again, maybe I'm not in a position to judge. I can't really read music either, and I don't have a very good ear. But I'm aware of my shortcomings in this respect and thus, WOULD NEVER MAKE MYSELF A CHOIR DIRECTOR!! If only others were as considerate...

But I digress.

Like I said, I've already taken part in a pretty fair number of Christmas-related activities. On Friday, I was invited to join the final-year BSc Chemistry students' Christmas celebration, and to take part in their Christmas Friend (read: Secret Santa) activities. They had decorated the classroom with streamers and balloons, and there was an Indian Christmas tree in the corner (basically a sawed-off tree branch decorated with streamers and balloons. But hey, they get an E for effort). Once everybody had arrived, we presented our Christmas Friend with their gift, and gave them a piece of cake. I really dig the fact that cake is apparently a big part of Christmas here. Of course, since I was the guest of honour, they made me go first despite the fact that I was obviously completely unaware of the proper protocol for how this was all supposed to go down. But, I made my way through it, and presented Revathy with a little ceramic Santa and card (and cake) to cheers and thunderous applause. I learned from the example of subsequent presenters that you're supposed to make the identity of your Christmas Friend a sort of riddle and cryptically list some of their characteristics. Oh well. I'll remember that for next time (yes, there is a next time. I've got a couple more of these bad boys to attend). So the "wonderful, lovely man from America who plays the guitar" got a little glass sailboat and a small brass replica lamp. I'm stoked. I really wanted one of those lamps! Once the gifts and cake were all distributed, the students asked me to lead them in singing some Christmas songs. I had brought my guitar and all-purpose book of music, so I felt ready for anything. Trouble was, the students don't know any of the Christmas carols we do!! (That's not entirely true-- they do know Jingle Bells and Silent Night). So it mostly ended up being a solo performance, with a few teachers joining in on the songs they knew. While I would've prefered a sing-along, this format allowed me the opportunity to sing some songs they probably wouldn't have known anyway-- namely, "Blue Christmas" and, yes, Parkway South fans "Do They Know It's Christmas?". And I managed to teach them a couple of our Christmas songs. In exchange they sang me some Malaylam film songs.

That evening was the YMCA Ecumenical Christmas Carol Service. More a choir-fest than a worship service, this event showcased several local choirs singing a few songs each. I knew that the Ecumenical Choir would be singing. We had practiced and prepared for it, and our performance of two songs (one in Malayalam, and "Angels We Have Heard On High") came off very well. I was not aware that the CSI choir would be performing. We had neither practiced nor prepared for this event, and the performance, like everything else this choir touches, was a disaster. But I don't think the audience could tell. So I just smiled and mumbled the Malayalam words I was seeing for the first time as well as I could. And of course, since we're in India, the programme started late and ran much longer than anticipated, so I missed dinner. Fortunately my friend, P.I. John was kind enough to invite me back to his house for some bread and jam and biscuits so I didn't have to go to bed on an empty stomach.

And most recently, last night was the UC College carol service. Every year, the residents of the men's hostel try to outdo the previous year in terms of decorating. This year, the Chackos (thus named because they're residents of Chacko Hostel) put up a huge tree reaching almost to the ceiling of the chapel and hung a hundred and one stars around the chapel, including one that had to be more than ten metres tall on a tree outside.

The carol service seems to have been a huge success. It was very well attended-- the chapel was packed to the gills, and probably a hundred people were standing outside. The choir sang very well, and I received many compliments on my solo and on the fact that I was able to sing the Malayalam songs with apparent ease. After the chapel emptied out, the choir and the Chackos had a sort of after-party. Well, maybe "party" isn't the proper nomenclature. We sat in the pews and had tea, oranges, and cake, and anyone who wanted to made a little speech.

I tried to have a friend videotape the service for me, but my battery died after just one song-- d'oh!!

Over the next week and a half, I'l be attending a whole bunch more Christmas activities, so I'll be sure to keep sharing what Christmas is like in India!

2006-12-11T07:58:00.000+03:00

Apologies!

To anyone who is actually interested in what I write here, and who hasn't given up on my blog entirely by now, I apologize for not being more diligent with my posts. It's certainly not for a lack of desire to write or a lack of content. I've been doing a ton of writing, and really want to share some of my thoughts, struggles, and experiences with you. But I simply don't get the time required to sit down at the computer and do it. Which is entirely contrary to what I'll be writing in an entry I post soon (I hope).

Anyway, I want to try and catch up with everything I've been meaning to post. So in order to make it a bit more manageable (for the writer and the readers), I'll try to do several relatively short posts rather than trying to catch you all up on a month's worth of life in one huge epic, which has been my tendency in the past (sorry about that too!), and which has, I think, been part of the reason that I haven't been able to post as much as I'd like. When it takes me an hour to write one massive entry, it's no surprise that I can't find the time to post often.

So bear with me while I try to catch up. I think I'll try to start with the more topical things first, and deal with the more philisophical musings later on.

peace.

2006-12-04T08:55:00.000+03:00

November Retreat Part II
(23-26 November 2006)

Ok, so I realize it's no longer November. I again apologize for my laxity in making these posts; but believe it or not, I've actually been too busy to spend any real concentrated time at the computer.

Regardless, the weekend before last (when it was still November), all of us volunteers got together in Trivandrum (Thiruvananthapuram, if you prefer) for a retreat/exposure program. The original plan was to get together at Achen's house for Thanksgiving on the 23rd and then head to Andhra Pradesh for an exposure program. However, because of the Sabarimala pilgrimage season, we were unable to get train tickets; so we had to revise our program. Instead, we decided to head down to Trivandrum on Thanksgiving and spend the weekend there learning about the plight of the fishworkers. The only problem was that this way, it didn't look like we'd get to have a special Thanksgiving dinner. Taking matters into our own hands, the volunteers hatched a plan to make our own Thanksgiving dinner on Wednesday night before we left. We'd all get together in Kottayam and make a turkey and stuffing and potatoes, and celebrate a good ol' fashioned American Thanksgiving together. But once we realized that we had no way to cook anything, and once Achen expressed his disapproval of the plan, we were convinced that we were just not meant to have a Thanksgiving dinner.

I have to admit that after our plans for Thanksgiving dinner were foiled, I did not have high expectations for this retreat. And one six hour train ride and one attack against my live-a-simple-and-responsible-life-of-mindfulness-and-love plan for my life later, I was not feeling much better upon our arrival in Trivandrum.

But such is this group that from the jaws of suckines, we can pull life, light, love, and laughter (and alliteration, apparently).

We arrived at the Animation Camp retreat centre around 6pm and all crowded into Achen's room where we reflected a bit on Thanksgiving. We told the story of Thanksgiving, explained briefly why we celebrate, and what the holiday means to us. We all shared some memories of Thanksgivings past-- Allison's slice of Norman Rockwell Americana, the story of Achen and Betty's first Thanksgiving in America, the story of how Cat's mom learned to celebrate again. And I...

How do you explain a Smith Family Thanksgiving to someone who doesn't know what a nose-flute is?

I tried, but Lord knows there are some things you simply can't describe with mere words.

Anyway, we talked a bit about things we've witnessed here that have moved us, and I think we all struggled a bit with the idea of Thanksgiving as one volunteer was moved to tears telling of a young girl who cannot attend the class field trip because her mother-- an abandoned woman who must support herself, her children, and a mother with heart disease-- can not afford the Rs. 200/- (about $4 USD) it would cost to send her. We all railed inwardly against the cruelty of a system that could allow this, and pleaded outwardly for an answer. Then, we all went around and said what we're thankful for-- loving people at home and in India, eachother, the challenges we face that help us to grow. We lifted up in prayer family and loved ones near and far, one another, and those we came here to serve.

And then it was time for dinner.

Unbeknownst to us, the staff at Animation Camp had been informed of what constituted a Thanksgiving dinner and had done their best to approximate it. So we had chicken and potatoes, and salad and veggies; none of it quite what we're used to, but all of it fantastic. The food would have been great on its own, but the love and attention that had obviously gone into it made it that much more special.

The next morning, the other volunteers presented me with a "birthday present." When we came together in the end of October for Betty's birthday, we composed and performed a song for her. I was informed that no one wanted to sing in front of me, so instead they came up with a little skit that depicted how some of my different personalities would respond to a particular situation. It was almost frightening how accurately Metal Andy, English Major/Teacher Andy, Buddhist Andy, and Crohn's Disease Andy dealt with the onslaught of an overly zealous Christian fundamentalist Indian student (played with gusto by Achen). It was embarrassing, humbling, and wonderful. I was mortified, I laughed until I cried, and I am still curious when and how they put this together.

The rest of that day was spent with two activist/film-makers, both named Santhosh. With them, we watched and discussed films and documentaries that relate to issues of interest and our work in India. We had some really good conversations regarding these films, and I think we all gained some valuable insights. And those of us working in colleges got some good advice on how to try and make students care about social issues and engage in meaningful discussion about them.

The following morning, we were up at the crack of dawn so that we could leave Animation Camp by 5am to get down to the beach by sunrise to watch the fishing boats do their thing. From a pier jutting out into the ocean, we watched as dozens of small fishing boats set out from the beach and spread their nets in hopes of a bountiful catch-- an increasingly unlikely scenario, as the ocean floor is being decimated by commercial trawlers that lack the personal connection to and understanding of the sea that these fishermen have cultivated for generations, and entire species of fish are being wiped out by the loss of this ecosystem and through overfishing. It was beautiful to see the sun rise over the sea, and it was interesting to watch the fishworkers pull the boats and nets onto the beach. But sadly, we actually learned very little. While we had some representatives of the fishworker's union with us, they really just talked amongst themselves in Malayalam and completely ignored our presence for the most part.

This scenario repeated itself again later when we visited Srothus, a community centre that works with women and children from the city. While we were again ostensibly meeting with representatives from the union to learn about the plight of the fishworkers and the role the union is playing in their struggle, a more accurate description would involve us struggling to stay awake while the "grown ups" talked with eachother in a language that even the best of us only understand the barest rudiments of. On the bright side, we got to met Sister Annie, the nun who runs Srothus. She's an absolutely amazing woman who has done some really incredible stuff-- like working in the Belgian Congo during its struggle for independence. As if we needed any further reasons to love Sister Annie, she gave us food. We ate breakfast and lunch at Srothus. Between the meals, we briefly went to a park where we sat under a palm tree sipping tender coconut water, and sat on a beautiful beach for a while. After lunch at Srothus, we went to Kovalam, another beautiful beach that seems to be a major tourist destination for Europeans (particularly Germans). So we spent the latter part of Saturday swimming, lying on the beach, and feeling scandalized by the tourists' and eachothers' lack of clothing. Before we headed back to Animation Camp, we decided to kick back on the veranda of a beachfront restaurant and sip tropical drinks while we watched the sun set over the ocean. So maybe this doesn't fit the traditional view of missionaries. But I think we all needed it. For the women in our group, it was a fleeting but vivid moment of freedom. For all of us it was a mental break from the pressure, doubt, stress, strain, and anxiety we all face on a daily basis. Like my trip to Ft. Cochin, it was a chance to step outside our experience for a couple of hours and laugh, argue, reminisce, and reflect on our experiences while being allowed the perspective one can only gain by getting away from those experiences.

The next day we headed back to the reality of our respective sites, but I know I at least felt refreshed and ready for whatever may happen next.

2006-11-27T08:57:00.000+03:00

November Retreat Part 1- Backwaters!
(17-18 November)

Before I get started writing about everything that's gone down over the last few weeks (sorry about the lapse, loyal readers!), I'd like to begin by wishing everyone a very happy belated Thanksgiving. Wherever you may be in the world, I hope the holiday was an opportunity for all of us to reflect on the fact that, like the Pilgrims and Native Americans, we are not alone in this world and we need to both help and depend on one another to survive, and for us to give thanks for the people and love we've been blessed with. And as we gorged ourselves on turkey, stuffing, pie, and cranberry sauce shaped like a can, I hope that everyone could take at least a moment to think of those who lack the material necessities to survive, and vow to live in a responsible way that will not deprive others of their right to life and happiness.

November here has been kind of a funny month. I think we, as a group, had a programme or a visit every week this month. It was a bit disruptive to the usual routine, and Achen was experiencing a bit of guilt over the fact that our work at our placements was being so regularly disrupted. I, honestly, didn't mind.

The most pleasant and important visit we had was from Shannon Langley, of the Presbyterian Church (USA). After some sizeable cutbacks and organizational shuffling back in May, Shannon found herself head of the Direct Mission Involvement office and as such, more-or-less in charge of the YAV program. So for the last three months, she's been traveling around the world, visiting every YAV site, learning as much as she possibly can about the program and the different sites and placements. Shannon was in India from the 16th to the 19th of November (I think). She visited each of our sites individually; and for the weekend, we all came together to spend some time cruising the backwaters of Kumarakom (near Kottayam) in a houseboat and to share a bit of our collective experiences, insights, challenges, and frustrations with Shannon, Achen, and each other.

We boarded the boat around 2pm on Friday the 17th. It was a beautiful day, and the backwaters were the tropical paradise every travel book and website in the world makes them out to be. I'll try to get some pictures posted to my photosite soon. The shore was lined with resorts, and we oggled all the white (presumably European) tourists lounging about in scandalously revealing shorts and tank tops.

It's funny how "Indian" we've all become-- Shannon commented on how well we all have the affirmative-head-wobble down (I fear that this habit may be hard to break and will cause some serious confusion upon my return), and the novelty we find in seeing other white people is a perfect avatar of cultural irony.

The scenic, touristy beauty of seeing the Keralan backwaters from a houseboat is not a perspective that most Indians will ever have of their country. But I think it's important for us to occasionally see the India they talk about in Lonely Planet guides and tourism websites. Otherwise, I think we risk burnout from the constant, prolonged exposure to the (or at least, our) reality of the country.

So we relaxed and really enjoyed our time on the boat. We had lunch, afternoon tea, and dinner on the boat on Friday, slept on the boat, and had dinner there Saturday morning before returning to land around 9am on Saturday. All the food was AWESOME (i really need to do a post just detailing what we eat here). And between meals we did Bible studies, shared our perspectives on the YAV program in India with Shannon, and shared our reflections, experiences, struggles, and triumphs with eachother. And just hung around enjoying the scenery and company, and taking pictures.

The only problematic part of the trip was the night. While there were sleeping quarters on the boat, there were only accomodations for 6 people. There were 8 of us. So Kyle and I volunteered to sleep outside on the deck, figuring that it would be awesome to sleep out under the stars. I think we also figured that we'd have some way of keeping the mosquitoes off of us, and that the crew wouldn't stay up until 2am watching movies, listening to music, getting drunk, puking overboard and passing out 15 feet away from us.

Ha.

So between the insistent whine of mosquitoes in our ears and the sounds of drunken revelry, I don't think either of us slept that night. But it was ok. At least we were awake to enjoy the thunderstorm that swept over us around midnight.

So after breakfast on Saturday morning, we returned to land and went our separate ways. Or, the other volunteers all hung out in Kottayam, and I returned to Aluva with Achen, Betty, and Shannon. Once in a while it's nice to be able to travel in the luxury of an air-conditioned car in lieu of a crowded, dirty, hot, noisy, train. As an additional bonus, I got to attend a couple of functions that Achen needed to stop at on the way. The first was a conference of Dalit theologians at the Amos Centre (where we spent the second week of our in-country orientation waaay back in September). Sadly, we didn't really get to spend much time there or talk much with the participants. Achen was sort of the keynote speaker; so we rolled in there, he did his thing, and we left pretty quickly because he had another function to be at in Ernakulam, about 2 hours away. This was the engagement party of someone who I think is Achen's nephew. We got there late, just as the reception was wrapping up. So we ate (oh my God, I ate so much food this weekend!), gave our best to the bride- and groom-to-be and their parents, and left. We finally made it back to Aluva and I took one heck of a nap.

After church on Sunday, in order to give Achen and Betty a break, I took Shannon to Fort Cochin and Mattanchery to show her what there is to see. We basically duplicated my earlier trip, so I won't go into much detail here. But it was again nice to just be a tourist for an afternoon. Although this time I was wearing my Indian clothes.

I worry about what Shannon will think of the South India program after she witnessed me having my mundu rewrapped in public by three midle-aged women at the Dutch Palace in Mattanchery. Apparently they approved of the fact that I was wearing a mundu, but not of the way I had it wrapped, so they took it upon themselves to fix. Before I knew it I had six brown hands all over my waist. While I thought nothing of this, Shannon and several European tourists in the room stared at the scene with combined horror and amusement.

In all, this was a great weekend. By Sunday night I was exhausted and completely stuffed, but after meeting with the other volunteers and Shannon, I felt good about how and what I'm doing here. Always a nice feeling.

2006-11-09T12:42:00.000+03:00

I'm an American...

... and let me tell you, it's an interesting time to be an American abroad. I've spent the better part of the last three days deeply in conversation with Indians of every hue-- Communist, Congress, and BJP; left, right, and centre; college professors, students, farmers, members of the legislative assembly, rickshaw drivers, shopkeepers, and theologians; men and women; rich and poor; Christians, Hindus, and Muslims-- about the Saddam Hussein verdict and how the rest of the world sees America. And the opinion is unanimous:

(and let me make it clear before I start that these views are those of the Indian people I've talked to. I don't want to start using this blog as my own personal soap-box. Rather, I'm making this post to inform other Americans of how we look to people in another part of the world. Even if my own personal opinions are conveniently similar to those expressed...)

Yes, Saddam Hussein was a horrible, violent dictator and tyrant responsible for the loss of untold innocent lives. And yes, world leaders need to be held accountable and brought to justice for their crimes against humanity. But I have heard over and over, to the person, that the US leadership is in absolutely no position to be condemning anyone for their human rights violations. Every single person I've spoken to thinks that George W. Bush, Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, and Condoleeza Rice are the worst terrorists and greatest threats to world peace today. Worse than the DPRK. Worse than Iran. Every person I've talked to believes that if we're setting the precedent of punishing world leaders for their crimes against humanity, Bush should be the first to swing.

And nobody is even bothering to talk about the legality or legitimacy of the court and its proceedings. There's not even a question that this whole farce was orchestrated by the US to kill Hussein and justify our otherwise unwarranted invasion and occupation of Iraq. All these Indians roundly reject the idea and practice of "victor's justice" and would like to see an international tribunal established for trying political, military, and even corporate leaders (and i think we'd find a lot of cross-pollination between these groups) for human rights violations.

Oh wait, there was one. And it subpoenaed the American leadership, and they simply chose to ignore international opinion and the validity of this tribunal. The Indians I've been talking to here don't understand how the US can go around acting like it is the only country in the world. How we can just completely ignore the opinions and reactions of the entire world and do whatever the hell we want without holding ourselves accountable to anyone.

Let me reiterate here that I'm simply repeating and reporting what I have univocally heard from the Indians I've talked to. My purpose here is not to filibuster, but to make people in America aware of how people in another part of the world perceive us. The media has been saying that the deliberate proximity of the Saddam verdict and the mid-term elections was used as a tactic to drum up support for the GOP. But I'm not sure that's entirely accurate-- I think it was more of a diversionary tactic. But not in the traditional sense of creating a crisis abroad to divert attention from issues at home. Rather, I think the importance attributed to this mid-term election conveniently served to divert America's attention away from the crisis we've created for ourselves abroad. If we're totally engrossed in what's happening in the US, maybe we won't hear THE REST OF THE EFFING WORLD speaking out against us.

Ignorance is, after all, bliss.

So like I said, I'm just writing to communicate what people in another part of the world feel. Maybe people in America will pay attention if an American says these things. I doubt it though...

America's actions since September 11, 2001, in the name of National Security and a War on Terror, have, I am told, only served to create more hate, more violence, and more terrorism, and we are progressively making the world more and more dangerous for ourselves. These actions (the War on Terror, our invasion of Iraq, the sham trial of Hussein) do not, contrary to popular American opinion, portray us as brave, strong, decisive, and just. They show us to be petty, greedy, petulant, paranoid, insecure, and short-sighted.

I'm using the pronouns "we" and "us" very deliberately here. Of course, we know that the American people don't declare war or make our foreign policy. We know that our government acts without the consent of its people. But as far as the rest of the world is concerned, our leaders do represent our country and its people, our values and opinions. Their qualities, character, faults, beliefs, and ideologies (and of course actions) are the basis of international popular perception of America and its people. For all intents and purposes, our leaders are America to the rest of the world.

This is terrible news when most people view elections as a choice of the Lesser of Two Evils.

(everything from here on out is my opinion, for those keeping score at home)

But just because it is our leaders, not we, who are doing all this damage, We The People are not blameless. We're guilty, I think, of deliberate ignorance and apathy. We can't be bothered to know what our leaders and our government are doing. If we knew, we might have to try and do something about it. We might have to compromise our comfort and luxury. So we write it off as somebody else's job. And then when we do hear about the atrocities our country is committing and the cruelty of our economic policies, we choose to ignore it, or shake our heads, say "What a pity," or "I didn't vote for him," and change the channel to American Idol. Like I said before, we completely insulate ourselves from the rest of the world so that we don't have to question the way we're living or take any responsibility for the effects of our lives and actions, or inactions.

And this is tremendously irresponsible.

We can bury our heads as deep in the sand as we'd like. But there is a whole world out there. And our leaders and their policies-- undertaken in our name, and with the tacit consent and approval of our silence-- are only galvanizing the opinions of that world more and more against us. So much for national security.

I've got my ear to the ground halfway around the world, and I can't ignore the pain and anger I hear. The US has soundproofed itself against the voice of the world, but we can't keep going like this. Something has to change. Something has to give. And something big is going to go down unless we, as a people and as a nation can make a dramatic change in our collective mindset. And I hate to say it, but simply changing the majority in our Congress isn't going to hack it.

Like I keep saying (sorry for being a skipping record...), we need to very closely examine our own lives and become aware of every word we say and don't say. We need to take a very personal interest in what our government does, and not be afraid to speak out. We need to be mindful of our consuming habits. And we all need to learn to be peace, love, and compassion.

Yes, we absolutely need to change our collective mindset and our political and economic structures. But before we can do that, we need to change ourselves.

2006-11-07T13:47:00.000+03:00

Contradiction, Diversity, Disparity

In my very first journal entry upon arriving in India, it was obvious to me that I wasn't in Kansas anymore. Or New Jersey, as it were. My first impressions of the country, based on a cab ride through Bombay, were that this country is the mother of all contradictions and dichotomies-- rich and poor, sacred and profane, East and West, Communism and Capitalism exist in an uncomfortable (for me to witness) but effortless unity. Having been here for over two months now, I'm gaining both confirmation and understanding of those initial impressions.

India has been Westernized to an almost troubling extent. Or at least Kerala has. In a conversation with a student yesterday, I was told, "You're in the wrong place if you really want to experience and learn about Indian culture." The basis of her comment is the fact that, among young people at least, there is a serious strain of Anglophilia. The more American you dress, act, and speak, the cooler you are. Students take a certain pride in not knowing their mother-tongue and in being ignorant of their history and traditions. But they can sing Western pop songs like it's their job. Understanding and appreciating the norms and culture of another, well, culture can be an important and valuable component of being a well-rounded person with a global perspective. Heck, that's probably a good portion of the reason I'm here. But when we abandon knowledge and appreciation of our traditions, history, and culture, we become trees without roots and we rob the world of one more set of valuable contributions and insights. And God knows global homogenization is happening quickly enough on its own. We don't need to help it along any.

But, like I said, India is a country where all sets of extremes nestle side by side. A.K. Ramanujan says, in the introduction to a book of Indian folktales, that "whatever you can truly say about India, you can also say the exact opposite with equal truthfulness." And even on the UC College campus, where students wear jeans and Nikes and proudly sing Brittney Spears, Backstreet Boys, and Celine Dion (all of which they, very troublingly, condsider rock...) songs, students also practice traditional arts and keep alive their ancient and vibrant culture and traditions. One boy in the men's hostel is a very talented tabla player. A girl in the English department is a singer of Carnatic music. Many students, both male and female, are amazing traditional dancers. So while some students have definitely traded in their Indian-ness for the prestige of looking, talking, and acting like Americans, many others seem to embrace their identity as Indian. And the majority, I'll assert, fall somewhere in between, possessed of a healthy balance of modernity and tradition.

Not quite so healthy is the economic disparity on display everywhere one looks in India. Before I came here, I was deluged with information about India's booming economy and unprecedented financial growth. But, as is the case anywhere in the world where a butt load of new wealth is generated, only a very small percentage of people in India benefit from this economic surge while the rest are plunged even deeper into poverty.

An editorial in yesterday's Hindu addressses precisely this topic. "India now ranks 8th in the world in the number of billionaires," the article tells us, "but clocks in at 127th in human development." In the last year, India "has added more newly hungry people [to the world] than the rest of the world put together." Child mortality due to easily preventable causes has actually increased since the 1990's. Millions of Indian children do not get any education whatsoever, and millions more are not having their nutritional needs met. And forget about medical care. "More than a fifth of [Indians] no longer seek health care of any kind. They just can't afford it." And it's not like people aren't working- "labour productivity in India shot up 84% between 1990 and 2002. But real wages in manufacturing fell 22 per cent in the same period." Forty per cent of India's population lives in a state of deprivation worse than that of sub-Saharan Africa. And yet the combined wealth of India's billionaires is second only to that of the US.

Something doesn't add up here.

I wish I could, at this point, say what we need to do to fix this. But I can't pretend to have the answers. I have ideas, and I know that there are people who are doing amazing things to both help the poor and suffering and try to change the structures that institutionalize this kind of inequity. But I hope this information can at least make us pause and examine our lives and the roles our consumptive habits and everyday choices may make in propagating and supporting this global inequality. Because they do play a role. Every choice that we make has global ramifications, and every change that we make can also create a change in the world.

Peace.

2006-11-07T09:55:00.000+03:00

Me and My Mundu

As I mentioned in my last post (and I'm only going to mention it in passing here as well. I'll write something insightful and meaningful about it soon, I swear!), last week was Kerala's 50th birthday as a state. As part of the celebration, people wore the traditional Kerala garb-- a cream-coloured sari with gold trim for the ladies, and a mundu and white shirt for the gents. This was my first time wearing a dhoti out in public (I wear my lungee in my room pretty frequently), and I loved it!

So now I'm wearing a mundu pretty much everywhere I go. I'm realizing, however, that this may create a problem of sorts. It's completely acceptable, and the Indian people love it that a saipu is wearing traditional clothing. They've actually taken to calling me "the Malayalee Saipu"-- the White Malayalee. Which is great. But this is also precisely the problem.

I've now completely annihilated any possible chance at relevance.

In listening to the people at the college or at Chacko Homes talk about previous volunteers, they never mention the work they did or the impact they had; they only talk about to what extent they succeded or failed in embracing the culture here. I hear about how good such and such volunteer was at eating with his or her hands; what foods they enjoyed or really disliked; how easily (or impossibly) Malayalam came to them; the trouble they had wearing a sari.

So now, instead of being remembered for the stellar communicative English classes I taught; instead of being remembered as the guy who started up the inter-faith fellowship/social issues discussion group; instead of being remembered as the guy who really threw down the gauntlet and challenged the SCF, NSS, and college as a whole to have a social conscience and acknowledge the presence and needs of a world outside their walls; instead of being remembered for my smile, warmth, insight, or music, I'm going to be remembered as "That Guy Who Loved To Eat And Wore A Mundu All The Time."

But I guess there are worse ways to be remembered. It's not like I'll be "The Guy Who Ended Up Hating India And Indians So Much That He Went Home And Told George W. Bush That The Country Is Laden With Oil." But who knows... it's still early in the year.

And I shouldn't be worrying about how I'll be remembered anyway. Got to keep my head in the present.

2006-11-02T12:25:00.000+03:00

**Nerd Alert**

Yesterday was Kerala's 50th birthday, and there's a lot that I wanted to write about its past, present, and future; its progress and problems. But while I was taking my after-dinner walk last night, I found myself thinking about something more important-- Lord Of the Rings.

In particular, I was contemplating what it means to live a life of service and how I view my role in the US in light of the experiences I'm having here. Old topics, yes. But somehow I ended up thinking about them in a new way.

The last line of the books popped into my head-- "'Well, I'm back,' he said."

Sam Gamgee had been on an amazing, transformative adventure and had played a pretty significant role in saving the world; but after that was all over, he returned to the Shire to live a "normal" life. And it seems to me that Sam's character and this line of text have some pretty deep implications for a life of service and for the transition from a great adventure into a "normal" life.

I see a lot of myself in Sam-- or at least a lot of qualities that I would like to have-- and think that there are some valuable lessons that I can learn from his life. To begin with, Sam is a servant whose actions are dictated by nothing but simple, uncomplicated love. And it is precisely these qualities that make him so noble and heroic.

As Frodo's gardener, Sam is, quite literally, a servant. He is motivated simply by the love of his master and the vow to never leave his side. So even after the Fellowship is broken and the other hobbits take on the roles of normative, combative, military heroes, Sam simply remains at Frodo's side as his servant and his friend. Even though he doesn't really understand it, Sam does everything he can to make Frodo's burden more bearable. And it's important to note that Sam's devotion and servanthood is based, not on submission or any power-based domination being exercised over him, but on love.

Frodo is the one who is burdened with the job of world-saving. While the powerful, visible, and famous heroes and leaders duke it out on the world stage, small, insignificant Frodo stumbles forward with the fate (and the weight) of the world around his neck like a millstone. He is, I think, our grass roots activists, struggling against all odds to save the world from the domination of evil, with no fame and no credit until their work yields fruit-- then they are snatched into the spotlight and turned into heroes. But labouring even more invisibly is Sam, who with his love and care supports his master, picking him up when he stumbles, keeping him company on the long, hard road. Sam isn't interested in the fame or power that the Ring represents and promises. He gets a glimpse of it, but it doesn't do anything for him. He actually finds the image of himself as a hero ridiculous. All he wants is for Frodo to be safe and happy.

I wonder if Sam ever questioned his role in the larger scheme of things; if he ever wondered what good he was in the Big Picture; if he was ever like "Man, Frodo and Aragorn and Gandalf are doing all the really important stuff. What the crap good am I?"

I don't think he did. I don't think he was at all concerned with or aware of what was going on in the Big Picture. For everyone else in the story, it may have been a matter of Good vs Evil, Fate of the World kind of thing. But Sam's only concern was Frodo-- keeping him safe and just doing the "Next Right Thing." The only thing that dictates Sam's actions is the mandate "Don't you leave him, Samwise Gamgee." Sounds easy, but I think Sam's job was harder than we give him credit for. Even though Frodo tries to sneak away, has his heart and mind poisoned by the power of the Ring and turns agains Sam, seems to be dead and captured beyond any hope of rescue, Sam's simple love and devotion spur him on to selfless, unsung acts of heroism.The most poignant of which, for me, is his insistence that "I can't carry it for you, but I can carry you."

When the burden and the damage inflicted on him during and by the harsh journey simply become too much for him, Frodo collapses, unable to get up again, in sight of their final destination. Sam has already possessed the ring for a short time and knows that Frodo could not bear to be parted from it. Sam is very clear that it is not his place to wield power. Their roles at this point are very well defined and immutable. Frodo is the ring-bearer, and Sam is his servant. But from his servant's position of powerlessness, Sam is able to make this heroic gesture. It's a powerful image; Sam, the servant, doggedly trudging up the slopes of Mount Doom carrying his half-dead master so they can get the job done.

When the real heroes become exhausted and fall short of the goal, it's the servants who have to pick them up and carry them those last few steps.

Wow.

So once the job is done, and the hobbits return to (and fix) the Shire, their adventure is over. Now what? Frodo, the ring-bearer, the saviour of the world, has been so changed and so damaged by his travels that he is unable to resituate himself in the life of the Shire. He suffers from the wounds and clings to the memories of his adventure, doing all that he can to keep his experiences alive-- writing a book about them, walking through the woods under the stars, meeting with elves and dwarves to hear news of the world outside. Similarly, Merry and Pippin, who became soldiers and warriors (of sorts) after the breaking of the Fellowship, also had trouble re-entering the normal, boring life of hobbits.

Sam was changed, yes, but he never stopped being Sam. He didn't have any trouble being a "normal" hobbit after his return because he had never stopped being one. Of course, he had grown from his experiences and adventures, and was wiser and more self-confident and had really grown into himself. But that's the difference... while the other hobbits were transformed into completely different people (or whatever), Sam just kept doing his thing and in the end was even more himself. And by returning home and re-entering life as a well-actualized, mindful, loving, and responsible hobbit, it is Sam who becomes the real hero by having kids and becoming the hope of the future. Sam was able to have the last line of the books and say "Well, I'm back" because he was the only hobbit able to return to and build on the life he left. The adventure of the ring pretty much marked the end of life for the other hobbits. For Sam it was just a beginning.

If that makes any sense at all.

So here, in brief, is what I get from this:
1) Be a servant. Serve from the basis of love and complete selflessness. Serve those who are struggling .

2) Because even the smallest act of love can have global repercussions, just be mindful in the moment and do the Next Right Thing. Don't worry too much about the Big Picture. And invest your energy working with people; not the Picture.

3) Don't overanalyze where you fit in or what possible good you are. Just do your thing, whatever that may be. And as long as you act out of love, selflessness, compassion, and mindfulness, your role will be a positive one.

4) Piggybacking on that last point-- don't judge what you do as any more or less good or worthwhile than what others do.

5) Contrary to what anyone might say, there is great heroism in living a "normal" life responsibly, mindfully, and lovingly and nurturing those same qualities in children (yours or others'). This is the only real hope for the future.

6) When your great adventure is over, take the lessons you've learned and use them to keep building a good, responsible life. Life doesn't stop when your adventure does.

7) Treasure the experiences and memories of your great adventure, but don't cling to them.

Peace

2006-10-31T08:28:00.001+03:00

Happy Halloween?

Please forgive my interrogative punctuation. It doesn't mean that I'm unsure whether you deserve to have a happy Halloween or not, or that I question the premises of the holiday and doubt that they deserve felicitation.

This statement is framed as a question in my mind simply because I can not effing believe that it's Halloween. My disbelief is mostly due to the fact that my whole year revolves around the months of October, November and December and their attendant holidays and celebrations. Fall is, without any competition, my favourite time of year. And Halloween for me embodies all that is good about fall. My excitement for this holiday grows and develops along a similar trajectory to a child awaiting Christmas. There are certain books (anything H.P. Lovecraft comes to mind), movies, and music that I listen to specifically to put myself even more in the mindset of the season.

But even without my well codified catalogue of preparatory materials, I always know when it's getting close to Halloween. Like the needle of a compass to magnetic north, I am drawn by some universal gravitic pull to the 31st of October. Which is why I'm so surprised that it snuck up on my like it did.

I guess this just goes to show how reliant we are on environmental cues. Without the change of seasons that I've lived with for the last 26 years, I have little or no way to contextualize where I am in the turning of the year. But whether I notice it or not, time keeps moving inexorably forward.

Which seems like a really good meditation on impermanence. No matter what is happening, good or bad, it will very quickly be swept away down the river of time. Some things may last for seconds, some years. But everything eventually passes away, giving way to the next thing. Right now I'm in the library. Soon I'll be in the canteen. Right now I'm in India. This time next year, who knows where I'll be. One day is very difficult for me. The next may be better. Or worse. Like the Heraclitan river, time is always moving and circumstances are always changing from one moment to the next, and there's nothing we can do to stop it and nothing we can hang on to as permanent. And yet we all spend an inordinate amount of time and energy trying to insist on some sort of permanence. We may as well try to stand in a swift river and will the water surrounding us at one moment to stay there forever.

But I've digressed again. Have a Happy Halloween, everybody! When you gorge yourselves on candy, do it in remembrance of me!!

2006-10-30T08:41:00.000+03:00

Since I Promised...

here is the text of the message I delivered at the UC College chapel two weeks ago. Like I addressed in an earlier posting, Christianity here (and in many other places) is troublingly one-dimensional, and I really tried to address and challenge that with this message. And, judging by the faces of the students in the chapel that night, I think I succeeded pretty well in challenging people. They looked as if I had gotten up in front of the altar, stripped naked, painted myself blue and punched a puppy in the face. With a screwdriver. They were horrified.

However, after the service, when I went over to the Principal and my advisor and asked, "So I'm never allowed to speak here again, am I?," they both said that it was a really good message and one the students really needed to hear.

I'll let you decide. Here it is:

I am a musician. It is through music that I make sense of the world I live in; it is with music that I tell stories; it is with music that I mark off the passage of time. Music is woven very deeply into the fabric of my life-- I take it seriously and love it deeply.

So I am very troubled by a type of music that Americans call "Pop," short for Popular, music. Pop music exists simply to make people feel good. It has no meaning and no message. It is nice to listen to because it is easy and safe-- neither the music nor the lyrics ask us to think or challenge our preconceptions. It makes us feel good and does not ask anything of us. And to people like me who value and love music, pop music cheapens and devalues the relationship between the listener, the artist, and the music.

There is an even more deeply troubling trend in Christianity in America, and I have seen it in India as well. This is a phenomenon that I will call Pop Theology, and the same terms I used to describe Pop music can be used to describe Pop theology.

Pop theology exists just to make us feel good. It has no meaning and no message. It is nice to listen to because it makes us feel good but doesn't challenge us or ask anything of us. It doesn't make us think and it doesn't challenge our beliefs, preconceptions, or lives.

Pop theology gives us a safe God and a safe Christ; a God who strengthens us when we are weak, forgives our sins, works everything out for our good, and answers our prayers in the affirmative. It gives us a Christ who sacrificed Himself so that we would not have to suffer, who offered up His life so that we could be sanctified, saved, and made clean, who rose from the dead to give us assurance of everlasting life. And these things are all important and true. But when we expect all these blessings and offer nothing in return-- when we accept the gift of Christ's sacrifice but ignore the message of His life-- we cheapen and devalue the grace that we are given.

Our God is NOT a safe God. Jesus is NOT a safe Christ. In Jesus' ministry on earth, He stood in direct opposition to the unjust power structures of His day. He challenged people's beliefs, preconceptions, and lives-- especially those who were considered particularly holy, pious, and devout. We can not accept the triumphant and risen Lord unless we also accept this living Christ and the messages of His life and the challenges He posed.

Jesus himself was very clear on this point. In John 12:26, He says, "whoever serves me must follow me." Every gospel tells us of Jesus' command to "take up your cross and follow me." In Matthew, His words are even stronger: "anyone who does not take his cross and follow me is not worthy of me." As Christians, we are constantly called to take up our crosses and follow Christ. Christianity is a call to action. Yes, we have to rely completely on God. Yes, we have to give Him praise, glory, and honour. But Christianity can not be just passive submission to the God we love. What it means to be a Christian is to follow the living Christ; to take up our crosses, follow the path that Christ walked, and live out the message of His life.

So what does this all mean for us? What is this cross we have to carry? What does it really mean to follow Christ? And why do we need to take this cross with us as we follow Him? If we closely look at Jesus' life, I think we will find that these questions, and thus their answers, are very closely bound to one another.

To begin to answer these questions, we need to look at the truth of the cross-- not the mystery or the symbol of the cross. So, what is a cross? Yes, it's a symbol of Jesus' death and triumph over death, it's a symbol of His sacrifice and our salvation. True. But that is the mystery, the symbol of the cross. What is a cross really? It is a torture device. It is a means of execution for (dramatic pause) criminals. Jesus was killed by hanging on a cross because he was considered a criminal. The life that He led, and the life that He calls us to, put Him in direct opposition to the secular and religious powers of His time. At a time when might was right, He taught non-violence and compassion. At a time when status and affluence went hand in hand, He told the rich and powerful to give up their riches and power. Jesus undermined social conventions and values by spending time with prostitutes, lepers, and tax collectors. He taught love and compassion for the marginalized in a highly stratified society. All of these teachings and practices threatened to unravel the fabric of society and start a political, social, and economic revolution. Jesus was a radical; a revolutionary. And as such, He was perceived as a challenge and a threat to those in power, and so was condemned to die a criminal's death on the cross. Jesus was not a safe Christ.

Jesus' message has not changed in the 2000 years since His death. Nor has society changed much either. These teachings, if put into practice, would still revolutionize the world. Christians who follow Christ's teachings (and what is a Christian if not someone who follows Christ's teachings?) would still be a threat to the people and institutions in power. So when we agree to take up our crosses and follow Christ, we agree to question, challenge, speak out against, and take action against unjust political, social, economic, and religious policies and institutions. We agree to let our lives be examples of a different way; a way of peace, of poverty, of humility, and compassion-- even if this puts us at odds with the powers and values of our time. We agree to live with and as those on the margins of our societies, and to be branded as outcast(e)s, radicals, and threats.

According to Jesus Himself, in the verse from Matthew, only if we live like this; only if we take up the cross and take on the role of the radical and the dissenter, and follow the dangerous teachings and example of His life; only then are we worthy of him. Only then are we deserving of His sacrifice and all its attendant blessings. No, ours is not a safe Christ.

2006-10-27T09:06:00.000+03:00

I was kind of worried about this past weekend. Monday and Tuesday were holidays for which the college would be closed, leaving me with a four-day weekend; normally a cause for celebration, but given the straits of some of my recent weekends, I was not looking forward to an extended amount of time with little to nothing to do.

So I undertook to actively find something to do; something I could only do in India. I can sit in my room and read, write, nap, and play guitar pretty much anywhere I happen to be for the rest of my life. Since I'm going to be spending the year in India, though, I think it can only enrich my experience if I try to use some of my free time to do things that I can only do while I'm here.

A number of people suggested that I visit Mattanchery and Fort Kochi. These are the "touristy" areas of the city of Cochin, replete with museums, historical landmarks, and shops, where European visitors go to soak up Indian history, culture, and life. And to buy things that commemorate this soaking. And while I was a bit apprehensive about having to get to, around, and back from the city by myself, I knew that the change of scenery and the opportunity to "get out of the house" would do me good.

The bus rides to and from Cochin, while long (about an hour and a half for a trip of 20 km), were simple-- a bus runs directly from the bus stand in Aluva to that in Mattanchery or Ft. Kochi. The only trick was figuring out which series of squiggles meant "Mattanchery" or "Aluva" (although I'm starting to be able to recognize this one pretty well). Malayalam is even tougher to read than it is to speak. But by asking enough people, I managed to end up on the right busses to and fro. So all was well.

I went to Mattanchery first, since geographically that made more sense. Mattanchery is the site of Cochin's Jew Town, a maybe-three-square-block area that is home to the very small population of Indian Jews, and houses a plethora of "antiques" and "handicrafts" (read: overpriced souvenirs) shops, and an old synagogue and an 18th century palace, both of which have been turned into museums of sorts. I arrived around noon only to find that the synagogue is closed between 12 and 3 pm. So I wandered the streets a bit, poking into some of the shops. I hate to admit it, but some of the souvenir crap these shops offer (and one shop's inventory really doesn't differ that much from the one next to it) is pretty nice. The wood-crafts, textiles, and jewlery especially would make nice gifts and, well, souvenirs.

OK, so they're not "really" Indian (I hate to tell you, but you don't find ornate wooden elephants or statues of Hindu deities or Bodhisattvas outside of tourist gift shops, just like you won't find miniature Statues of Liberty in a "normal" American store-- although the US is pretty good at making any sort of retail establishment into a tourist gift shop. But I digress...) and the items are way overpriced in order to empty American and European pockets, but I wouldn't feel too bad about returning home with some of this junk.

The problem with "shopping" (which I'm none too good at anyway) is the aggressiveness of the shopkeepers. These guys line the street outside their stores, and when they see a saipu coming, the little dollar (er... rupee) signs pop up in their eyes. Walking down the street was like running the gauntlet. Every one of these guys would at the very least call out to me, "Hey, my friend! Come look in my shop!" Most would race toward me, throw an arm around my shoulder and try to forcibly drag me into the store. More often than not, I had three or four guys hanging off of me, all pulling me in different directions. It felt like I was being drawn and quartered. The stores I ended up going into were the ones where no one tried to entice or force me in. Even in these places, however, as soon as I was in the door, the shopkeeper would be right at my shoulder, brandishing elephants and gods and shawls and necklaces at me, explaining why I should buy each item in the store; heading off my path so as to herd me toward the more expensive items, and promising me a good price. Given the figure I cut, what with my disheveled hair, shabby clothes, and scruffy beard, I can't imagine where these guys got the idea that I would have any money on me at all, but there we were.

When I couldn't handle the entrepeneurial hectoring anymore, I headed over to Mattanchery Palace, a palace gifted by the Dutch to the Rajas of Travancore in the 1700's as recompense for the razing of several Hindu temples in the vicinity. The Palace now operates as a small museum that houses portraits of the Rajas, old weapons, litters, and palanquins. But the highlights of the palace are its several murals that depict scenes from the Mahabharata and Ramayana. The murals are in diverse states of decay and disintegration, but were still striking. Visiting the museum was a nice opportunity to step back and just be a tourist for a while; to disengage myself from real life here for a bit and get to romanticize India a little.

Leaving the Palace, I walked next door to the Idiom Book Shop, which is well-respected for its collection of books pertaining to all things Indian. I hung out in there for a little while (it was air conditioned-- a rare luxury here!) and browsed Kerala cookbooks (it's nice to know they exist, just in case I can't find anybody willing to teach me to cook), photo books, travelogues, and social and political analyses. Bibliophile that I am, this is definitely a place I'll end up making several more trips to.

When I was finished there, I hopped in an autorickshaw and headed the 2.5km to Fort Kochi. I got off at the waterfront, which is sort of the Middle of Everything. The waterfront is lined by what amounts to a large outdoor market. Various stalls line the street, selling food, fish, coconut water, more souvenirs, books, jewelery, paintings, postcards, and clothes. I wandered the marketplace, again being chased down the street by overzealous salesmen. And when it, again, became too much to handle, I headed over to the beach to have a look at the famous Chinese fishing nets. If you've ever seen pictures of Kerala, you've seen these huge nets. They operate on a system of pulleys and counterweights (huge rocks) and get dropped and raised by hand every few minutes.

If you're white (again, dollar signs in the eyes), the fishermen call you over to one of the nets and invite you to help them work it. They take your picture and tell you the sad story of how commercial overfishing and ecological degradation are depleting the aquatic life, so now they often go for days at a time barely catching anything and can't manage to make ends meet, and they explain how far just a few hundred rupees can go towards feeding their families. So you give them a few hundred rupees. I'm sure this is all true and that theirs is a legitimate plight. In fact, I know it is. I don't want to sound cynical, but these guys are basically actors who are out to cash in on the tourist season in a no-less-shameless way than the shop owners. The only difference is that the fishermen are selling tourists an experience and the opportunity to feel like they're doing Something Good, rather than little wooden elephants. But I understand that they really do have to make a living and feed their families, just like the shopkeepers (and teachers, cobblers, tailors, and farmers) do. Just like everyone everywhere does. So in short, I'm aware of how manipulative what they're doing is, but I also realize that it probably does stem from a universal need to survive.

So I bought into it and went over to one of the nets and worked and talked with the guys there for about an hour and, yes, gave them some money. But rather than letting that be the end of the transaction like most tourists, I'm hoping that I can go back there fairly regularly and spend whole days working and talking with these guys, and really get to experience what life is like for them. Really understand (as much as a middle-class American who knows he will be returning to middle-class America can) the problems and struggles they face, and build relationships that can possibly be transformative for me and for them.

After my time working on the net (those things are heavy, man!), I was pretty hungry so I went in search of something to eat. It was late for lunch (about 3:00), so most of the stalls along the waterfront were closed. What you can do is buy some fish from a fishmonger behind the nets on the beach and then take it to one of the stalls where they'll cook it for you. That's what I wanted to do, but I guess it was time for the afternoon siesta and they were all closed. So I just walked until I found a reasonably clean-looking outdoor restaurant. I was the only customer, so the whole staff of the restaurant crowded around my table and hung out while I was waiting for my food. They're so used to just dealing with tourists, that they were completely blown away by the fact that I'll be living here for a year and that I'm learning Malayalam and am genuinely interested in the life and culture of Kerala. I had a fairly simple meal of fresh red snapper (served whole, eyes included) with a red curry sauce and some Kerala rice. The food was very fresh and really good, so I boarded the bus back to Aluva quite satisfied.

Like I said before, this little outing was probably the best thing I could've done for myself at the time. I really needed the change of scenery and the change of psychological space. The process of adjusting to life here is so exhausting and emotionally draining that it was really nice to be able to step out of that for an afternoon and just be a tourist. At the same time though, as my experience with the fishermen shows, it's satisfying to know that my experiences and interactions (or transactions, as the case may be) here are much deeper than just tourism. I feel very blessed to have the oportunity to really engage the life and people of Kerala and enter into mutually transformative relationships with the life here and the people who live it.

2006-10-25T09:59:00.000+03:00

I Think I Can Finally Call Myself A Runner

Sure, I was on the track team through high school and most of college as a pole vaulter and occasional sprinter. In the three (three and a half....eek!) years since graduation, I've run off and on-- I'll run for a couple of months and then either get injured or frustrated by the unreasonably high goals I set for myself and stop. But I've never considered myself a runner. Since I've been in India, however, I think I can finally call myself a runner.

I'm running six days a week, doing speedwork twice a week and a long run on Sundays, even though there's no event I'm training for. I'm out there running in the blistering heat, crushing humidity, torrential monsoon rains and crepuscular darkness (sometimes all during the course of one run) for no reason other than love. Running has come to occupy a central place in my life since I've been here, and it helps me to process and understand the new and strange surroundings I'm in and the often even-stranger interior landscape of my thoughts, feelings, and experiences.

My runs help me mark off the passage of time-- my days revolve around meals and my evening (and sometimes morning) run. My runs give a rhythm and a routine to my days and weeks.

They also help put me in touch with the patterns and cycles of nature and the rhythm of life here. Running around the fields at UC College, I can tell from the dense cloud of dragonflies at one end of the soccer (sorry... football) field that it's going to pour in about 15 minutes. When the air is filled with the prayers being broadcast from nearby mosques, I know that it's quarter after six and I have another forty-five minutes before it gets too dark to run anymore. Some evenings, I won't wear a watch and will just head for home when the first group of small bats starts to dart and swoop over the field.

My runs get me out and interacting with people. The paperboys in the mornings, and folks on their way home from work in the evenings. For every person who laughs and yells what I can only assume are rude comments at me as they whiz past on their motorcycle, there is another who will slow down to keep pace with me and ask my name and what I'm doing in India; about my "native place" and family; what I think of Kerala and if the food is too hot.

Running also helps me stay in touch with my own rhythms-- of my feet hitting the ground, of my breath, of my heartbeat, of my thoughts. Sometimes I think that running might just be the best meditation practice there is. And as such, it's a very important, special, and sacred time for me. I'd like to say that I use my runs as a time to process the events of the day, to sort through my often indecipherable feelings, but that's not quite true. Since most of my attention goes towards just staying alive and upright,-- one foot in front of the other, remember to breathe in and out-- conscious, deliberate thought and processing are kind of out of the question. Rather, thoughts arise and pass away naturally with little to no commentary or analysis. Just awareness of their existence while my attention is on my breath and my footfalls. And I think this keeps me much more at peace and much more aware of what's really going on inside than my normal selective attentions possibly could.

Some days, I let my feelings and emotions power my runs. Some days I just let them all pour out as I burn some 800 repeats. Some days I put everything I've got into my run-- all my love, all my hate, all my joy, all my despair, all my insecurity, all my fear, all my hope, all my doubt, all my faith. These runs are the most exhausting, and the most cathartic. It's really useful to feel everything that's in you at a given moment; acknowledge its presence, really feel it, and let it out. And that's all. Don't dwell, don't obsess, don't even think. Just be.

Running is also just about the only thing I do that is just for me. Most people (certainly the majority of people here, and even most of my loved ones at home) don't understand why I run. And they don't have to. To quote Penny Arcade, "It's not for you." Nobody else has to understand. Heck, I don't even have to understand. It's something that I do for myself and myself alone. And that's a really important, special thing.

2006-10-19T12:57:00.000+03:00

Note on the Previous Two Posts

Lest anyone think that I'm miserable here or just spend my days alone in my room pining for all things American, I want to clarify a bit, because I realize how bad those posts must sound.

Both of those entries were written over the weekend, although I didn't get to post them until yesterday and today, respectively. And, like I said in one of the posts, I was just being really hard on myself this past weekend, and being really critical of what i saw as my failures in adjusting to my new surroundings and involving myself in life here.

In all actuality, I do feel pretty good about what I'm doing here and think I'm doing a pretty good job at involving myself and accepting the culture. Like I've said before, I actually feel I have a really healthy balance of work/involvement and things I do for myself. I just really have this bad habit of holding myself up to completely unrealistic expectations and then beating myself up when I invariably don't meet them. It's something that I have to work on.

But don't be worried by those last two posts. I'm being much kinder to myself this week.

andy out.

2006-10-19T10:05:00.000+03:00

Along The Same Lines As The Last Post

I've found myself doing, or thinking about, or clinging to a lot of American things, or a lot of things that are vestiges of my life in America. I read Runner's World (which gets sent to my folks and then they forward it to me) and sci-fi novels, listen to my music whenever I can, and catch myself daydreaming (a lot) about video games, movies, Lost, and electric guitar. I spend most of the workday screwing around on the computer and even manage to keep up to date with Penny Arcade and stay reasonably well-informed about what's happening in the World of Warcraft.

I tell myself that I do these things to keep myself sane- to remind me of who I am and to make myself feel closer to the people, places, and things that I love. But I know that's just rationalizing and that in reality, I'm clinging for comfort to the ways I identified myself (possibly my Self) in the US.

I guess I'm afraid of changing too much; of returning home a completely different person and finding that I've decimated the life I had begun to create for myself before I left. I had some really good things going for me that I'm scared to lose. So I persist in the interests and activities that I engaged in at home (or think about them and look them up on the internet when I can't actually do them) in the hopes that I can hang on to some of the person I was before I left. But in this setting, I feel really guilty about these activities and try to hide them like a Dirty Little Secret-- if someone shows up at my room, I'll quickly shove my iPod and recent issue of Runner's World under my pillow, like I just got caught looking at porn.

God forbid that anyone should know that I'm not perfectly well-adjusted here after a month and a half. I certainly can't have anyone know that I miss the Noise and Diversions (to say nothing of the people-- but this post is about the Stuff I miss.) of my life in America. I've been practicing Buddhist meditation off and on (mostly off) for two years- I should be totally free from the notion of a self, especially one defined by video games, sci-fi movies and novels, indie rock, hip hop, and metal. I should be perfectly comfortable with silence, solitude, and uncertainty and view distractions like TV, music, and video games with disdain, rather than thinking of them as iportant aspects of my Self.

I had to write all that out like that just so I could see how ridiculous my expectations of myself really are. So maybe it's not fair to expect perfection from myself. But, perfection aside for the moment, I feel like this clinging to these ways of identifying myself is really hindering my full entrance into and embracing of life here and could have a really negative impact on my experience. On the other hand though, I feel like I need the safety-net of these diversions and distractions sometimes. Any thoughts or suggestions?

2006-10-17T09:59:00.000+03:00

Just Give It Time

... so it was kind of a rough weekend. If you look back at some of my previous posts, you'll see that I've set some pretty lofty goals for myself, for my year here, and for my life afterwards. I want to learn to be totally accepting of people and be willing to completely share my life with them, and be fully engaged in life here. I want to respond to the uncertainty of my life here with grace and humour. I want to always live the truth of love, peace, and compassion.

I know that I may never achieve these things in the duration of my time on earth, and I'm well aware that I'm certainly nowhere even close yet. Even so, I spent all weekend positively beating the hell out of myself for falling so short of these goals and aspirations.

For one thing, it's becoming clear that the "Honeymoon period" is over. There are (depending on who you ask) four or five distinct stages in the process of cultural adaptation (i have an irrational aversion to the phrase "culture shock"). The Honeymoon is the first period that apparently lasts just about a month where everything is exciting and new and you just love everything about your new culture. Eventually however, and this is where I am, you begin to feel isolated, alienated, and even threatened by the new culture. Things that you previously found endearing now start to be irritating, and you start to withdraw and isolate yourself. Whereas before, people were friendly and welcoming, you now begin to see them as hostile and unhelpful. This is all completely true of my perceptions now (i say "perceptions" because my experiences are not any different from what what was happening my first month here... simply my perception of them has changed). In September, I felt like a celebrity-- everybody pointed and stared and said "Hi" to me and wanted to talk to and find out all about me. These same situations now make me feel less like a celebrity and more like a sidewhow freak. This must be what it feels like to be a midget. Everybody points and stares and laughs and makes what i assume are disparaging comments about the saaiyp, and I start to feel really alienated and uncomfortable, and thus begin to isolate myself. And I know intellectually that this isn't the case; that it's just my perceptions and insecurities, that it's a textbook case of the second stage of cultural adaptation. But I made my Rules for Survival.... so I beat myself up for failing to adhere to them.

And then there's Alfred.

I'm trying really hard to learn and put into action the lessons I'm learning here about openness and relationships and all that good stuff, and I've been doing really well (for me). (I am capable of giving myself credit where it's due.) But I'm becoming more and more sure that Alfred has been placed in my path just to show me how far I still have to go and how much work I still have to do in this department. Alfred is a first-year student at the college who was basically stalking me for a couple of weeks there (he found out where i live without my ever telling him; he would watch me for days at a time until he figured out my schedule and would then strategically position himself so that we would "bump into" eachother). I laid down some really clear boundaries, but he still shows up from time to time. Whenever I decide that I really need a day to myself where I can just nap, read, write, play the guitar and listen to some tunes, Alfred is sure to show up, grinning, in my doorway, expecting me to go somewhere with him. And when I think I've gotten rid of him, he's sure to show up a couple of hours later asking why I didn't show up for a renedzvous I never agreed to.

And I get so mad at and am so rude to him-- I go out of my way to show him just how unwelcome he is at that particular juncture in time; I find every excuse to cut our conversations short; and on Saturday (one of the previously mentioned days-i-decided-i-needed-to-myself), I outright yelled at him when he showed up at my room for the third time that day (in my defence, I had been in the middle of a kick-ass nap when he rang my doorbell... you try being nice to someone who just woke you up!) This is definitely not Christian behaviour, and does certainly not adhere to the standards of warmth, love, and hospitality I want to learn to extend to all people.

I want to be loving, and I want to be kind, and I want to be open and generous with my time and space... but I want to do it on my terms and at the properly designated times. And Alfred is here to show me that that's not the way it works. And as soon as he's gone, that initial relief gives way to a torrent of guilt. I get really disappointed with myself at how far I've strayed from the principles that I want to let govern my life. And I know that no one is perfect and that we need to forgive ourselves when we eff up. I also know that everyone has that one person (heck, most people have a lot more than that...) who they absolutely can not handle. So I know it's not fair to beat myself up over this either.

I've just got to keep trying, keep Practicing, and pray for the grace to do better next time. And I've got to be willing to be patient and move in baby steps. Just give it time...

2006-10-13T14:41:00.000+03:00

An Interesting Conversation

So I had a really interesting conversation yesterday. At choir practice, I was talking with one of the girls who seems to be something of a leader in the Student Christian Fellowship (SCF) on campus, and she asked me what college Christian groups are like in the States. I didn't really feel qualified to answer that because I went to a school that was predominantly Jewish and that at that point in my life, I wasn't really involved with Christianity at all-- on campus or otherwise. She explained that the reason she asked is because she feels that the Christian worship and activities and organizations at UCC are lacking something. I agreed and volunteered that, from what I've seen so far, most Christianity in Kerala is very one-dimensional in one (and in some cases both) of two ways. Christianity here is ancient (by Christian standards)- the apostle Thomas of Syria allegedly converted several Brahmin families in 52 AD- so a pretty good percentage of worship services are just rote repetition of centuries-old formulas. There is also, however, a very modern evangelical movement that teaches nothing but pop-theology (the religious equivalent of Brittney Spears, perhaps) that just wants to make you feel good without making you think or challenging your sensibilities. Either way, Christianity is robbed of its vitality and loses what, for me, is the crux of its message.

Don't get me wrong-- there's nothing at all wrong with centuries-old traditions. They can provide us with strong spiritual roots and keep us in touch with our spiritual ancestors. They can be a way of making our worship and faith timeless and eternal. But there's a fine line between timeless and dead. And when tradition is practiced just for tradition's sake, we've got problems. When we do the Dance and say the litanies but don't think about why we do them or what they mean, we're just resounding gongs and clanging cymbals. And this is precisely the case here. Worship at the College is dead and repetitive. The deified founders of the College put together a small book of worship- and these same services, with no variation, have been repeated every Sunday since 1921. I was informed that the students don't enjoy these services and don't get anything out of them. When I asked why nothing has been done about this, she said that the Powers That Be at the college are very protective of these worship services; they absolutely insist on the persistence of tradition, for better or worse. And then she said something that really struck me- 'these services are to worship the college and its traditions-- not God.' And that really sums it up, doesn't it? When our worship is nothing but tradition for its own sake, what we're really worshipping is ourselves and our traditions- not God.

And there's also nothing wrong with pop-theology either, per se. It's important to believe in a God who strengthens us when we're weak, who forgives our sins and answers our prayers in the affirmative. It's important to worship a Christ who suffered and died so that we might be made clean and be saved. But we walk a slippery slope when we do this without listening to the message of Christ's life. By focusing just on His death and resurrection and what they mean to us, we ignore His life. And by denying the messages of Christ's life, we rob Christianity of its most important messages and its life. Jesus was born into the world and did exactly what pop-theologians avoid; He made people think, He stood in direct opposition to the unjust power structures of His time, He called into question the way people were living-- especially those who portrayed themselves and were esteemed as being particularly holy, pious, and devout. He taught peace, compassion, and generosity. He told us to care for one another; to relinquish our love of material posessions and live simple, responsible lives; to take up our crosses and follow the road He walked. To follow the example of His teachings and His life.

Do we feel truly challenged by the Christ we worship? Do we view Christianity as a call to fundamentally alter the material realities of our lives? Or do we want our religion to "sing me a song about Jesus that'll make me feel happy inside; sing me a song about forgiveness that'll make this lifestyle feel justified?"( in the words of singer-songwriter David LaMotte). The teachings of Jesus' life are conspicuously absent from many Indian churches (and many American ones, for that matter). There must be more money in making people feel good about their lives.

The young people in the Church (in India and the US) have a crucial job and a huge responsibility- to bring joy and life to the worship of God and Christ while still retaining and nurturing our tradition's roots. To take seriously Christ's call to humility, service, suffering, and responsibility, and to do so joyfully.

These are all things we talked about, and I'm glad we did. I was beginning to think I was just a judgemental American criticizing Indian institutions that I know nothing about. It's reassuring to find out that there are young Indian men and women who see these problems in our religion, acknowledge them as problems, and want to do something about it. The question now is what? and how?

2006-10-12T07:55:00.000+03:00

Extending These Lessons

In applying the below lesons to my probable life back in the States, and how I can put them to use in my current situation, I think I'm starting to get a sense of what my work in the world can be.

I think it's time to admit to myself that I'm not of the aptitude or persuasion to be a political or social activist. I still think that these jobs are extremely important, extremely heroic, and absolutely need to be done; that's probably why I've tried to be interested and involved in them for so long. But I now realize that these noble endeavours are best left in the hands of other, more capable people. My calling, I think, is a different one.

While these others pave the way for political and social revolution, I feel my responsibility is to work to bring about personal, internal revolution. I truly believe that the best thing I can do for the world (present and future) is to lead a quiet, simple, humble, responsible, normal life, and cultivate the seeds of love, peace, and joy in myself, my loved ones, friends, and family, and to teach others to do the same. It's becoming more and more likely that when I return to the States I'll look into teaching (i think i'd like to do high-school, but i found that i was really enjoying middle-school before i left. So who knows...). I think that as a teacher i will have the opportunity and ability to be a positive force for change in the lives of our children; not through what I teach (unless there are public high schools that offer classes on the Sermon on the Mount or the 14 Precepts of Mindfulness), but through how I teach and relate to people.

Thich Nhat Hanh says that a person is like a garden. In the soil of our hearts and minds, there are many seeds-- seeds of love and seeds of fear. Seeds of anger, violence and hate, and seeds of peace, compassion and joy. Which seeds will grow and thrive depends on which of these seeds we water and cultivate. We live in a culture that is very good at cultivating anger, fear, hate, violence, and alienation. If left untended, these weeds can overrun our gardens and strangle the buds of love, compassion, peace, and joy. If these weeds grow big and strong enough, they can even steal the sunlight and rain that might otherwise nurture the delicate and beautiful flowers. These positive seeds need to be nurtured, especially in our young people, if there is to be any positive change in our world. If and when the political, social, and economic orders change, what will be the good if the generations that inherit the new world are still consumed by fear, anger, hate, and violence?

Many (most?) young people today only have their negative seeds watered, and many feel alienated and eventually despair; they give up on life before they've even had a chance to live it and turn to drugs, alcohol, violence, and damaging sexual relationships- all of which are perfect fertilizer to make the negative seeds even stronger. I believe that by cultivating peace, joy, love, and compasion in ourselves and letting our lives display these beautiful flowers, and by treating young people with respect, love, and compassion, we can show them another way and help to nurture these same seeds in them. This, I think, is how I can help. By nurturing peace, love, joy, and compassion in myself, I can share these things with my friends, family and (hypothetical) students and let that be my contribution to a new and better world, and leave the more visible world-saving to others.

2006-10-11T12:03:00.000+03:00

Some Lessons So Far....

As you can probably tell, I've been faced with what, for me, have been some significant challenges in the month-and-change I've been in Kerala. And since I don't even want to risk getting pessimistic about my time and work here, I've been using these challenges as opportunities to reconceive of my life and to gain a new persepctive. Here are some big lessons I've gotten so far:
Community/Relationships and Openness
(when I wrote these out in my journal, i put these under two separate headings, but since they're so inter-related, I'm going to combine them here...)
In my research on South Africa *mumble* years ago, I repeatedly came across the word and idea ubuntu. A key element in traditional African philosophy and spirituality, ubuntu translates pretty nearly to "we are people through other people." It is our relationships and communities that make us human. Without these, we can not be fully human.
I have found this same idea vividly alive in India; it is so much a part of life here that there's not even a word for it. It's just taken for granted. In Kerala, every part of one's life is lived in relation to others; every experience is shared. Relationships are intimate and instantaneous- people who have never met before approach one another without reservation and chat like they've known each other for years. And this is the rule-- not the exception. As I've already groused about at some length, the idea of doing something by oneself or of wanting to be alone is completely unknown in Indian tought. And while this seems to be kind of taking it to an extreme (you've got to have some time and space for yourself, don't you?), it is a vivid example of what it means to live deeply in community. And since we are all brothers and sisters and, I would contend, are all the same and part of each other, this is a very important lesson in seeing God, Christ, and ourselves in every other person.
An important corollary to everyone being everyone else's brother, sister, and friend is an almost reckless sense of openness. If we truly acknowledge our sibling-hood, same-ness, and interdependence, there can be no separation in or between our lives. The first time you meet someone here, they give you full access to their life and expect the same. They ask for your phone number, e-mail, street address, and that of every member of your family and all your friends.They will almost invariably also invite you to their house right this very minute for tea, invite you to visit their ancestral home for a weekend to meet their family (who they know will just love you), and probably invite you to the wedding of their cousin next weekend. Sincerely. The first time they meet you.
The people here want to share their lives with you and earnestly hope for and expect full access to yours. And to me, this often feels intrusive and invasive. But when I think about it as an expression of true community, it's a very nice idea.... even if the practice is still kind of off-putting. It makes it so that other people are always more important than oneself. People's doors are always literally and figuratively open; and whenever a guest drops by unannounced, they are always more important than whatever you were doing before they arrived. And even if there's something you absolutely have to do, it can wait until after you've spent a little time with your caller. People and our relationships are always more important than our jobs or self-interest. Again, because of this emphasis on relationships and community, you completely share your life- your time, space, attention, resources- with others.
I hope I can learn to become at least a little like this over the course of the year, and remember it when I get home, so I can put it to use in whatever I end up doing-- to keep my door and heart open to all people, to deny no one entrance to my life, and to be willing to share all that I have of time, energy, attention, space, resources, and love with any- and everyone.
(I actually had an experience that reaffirmed this sense of community and openness after I wrote this in my journal-- I went out for a run the other night, and as i was walking home drenched with sweat and smelly, a fellow I'd met once at the CSI (Church of South India) came bustling out of his house and called me over. Before I knew what was happening, his arm was around my shoulder and I was being ushered into the house, which was full of other people. It turns out they were having a memorial service for his mother-in-law, who passed away over the wekeend. I was directed to the couch where I sat down in my dripping shorts and t-shirt, sweaty, smelly, and completely mortified. But i was served tea and snacks and was engaged in friendly conversation by everyone around, most of whom i had never seen before. Fortuantely, the company started breaking up after i had been there for only a half hour or so, so i was able to excuse myself and go home to shower. the funny thing is, i'm getting used to this kind of hospitality and, once i figured out what was going on, i wasn't surprised at all. I was still embarrassed and uncomfortable because a) my attire was completely inappropriate for even being seen out in public (i try to stay pretty well out of sight when i'm running...) and b) i smelled like a high-school locker room. But that's beside the point....)
Let Your Life Speak Where Words Fail
Last week I was talking to a student at UC College and getting very frustrated. His English wasn't good by any stretch of the imagination, but I could make out what he was trying to get across. He, on the other hand, had no idea what I was saying. No matter what I said or asked, no matter how slowly, clearly, and simply I expressed myself, he would just smile and wobble his head in agreement. At one point, after several failed attempts to talk about cricket and football, he asked me if I drink. When I said "No," (which he evidently understood) he got really confused and asked why. By this point in the conversation (or whatever you'd call it), I knew that trying to explain would be fruitless so I said "I simply choose not to," (blank stare, smile, wobble) and left it at that.
But that experience left me wondering-- when I go to live in the hostel (what we'd call a dorm, although it's more like a cell block-- the residents are even called inmates and the RAs wardens), or interacting with students in any other setting, trying to be a positive influence and a good role-model for them, how can I get complex messages and ideas about responsibility and morality across to them with such a limited common lexicon? And what I've tentatively decided is that talking and lecturing isn't the right way to get messages like these across anyway. It's just like with students at home-- words will go in one ear and out the other and probably not make any sense during their brief sojourn through the head. But the way you act and the way you live are what will get your message across. Your life can convey a very deep message much more simply and effectively than any words possibly can.
So if, at the College and everywhere else, I can let my life be an example of love, compassion, respect, patience, and peace, those who pay attention will learn the lessons I hope to convey.

2006-10-10T08:13:00.000+03:00

First Retreat
(4-7 October, 2006)

Last week, the five volunteers, along with Thomas John Achen, Betty Kochamma, and Joy Joseph, all got together at a multi-purpose Catholic centre called Hosanna Mount in the town of Pala (or Palai) for our first retreat.
Pala is in an absolutely beautiful rural area in the midlands of Kerala, where the land starts working its way upwards towards the Western Ghats (the mountain range that forms the state's eastern border). The retreat was a time of relaxation, reflection, fellowship, study, sharing stories, triumphs, failures, frustrations, joys, and songs.
I've got to say, i never thought i wold be so happy to see a group of white people in my whole life! It was such a relief to be able to speak in "normal" English- fast, with polysyllabic words, rambling sentences, and colloquial slang - and be understood; to have my sense of humour understood (as much as it ever is...); and to hear that everyone, to greater or lesser degrees, has encountered many of the same challenges and struggles I've been facing, and to find out how others are dealing with said challenges and struggles.
We're all dealing with a certain amount of ambiguity in our placements (what exactly is it i'm supposed to be doing here anyway? how is teaching english to middle class college students doing God's work in the world?), and some frustration with the lack of any real outreach, grass-roots, NGO, whatever-you-want-to-call-it component to the program. A good percentage of the other volunteers are also having difficulty redefining privacy and personal space. Hearing my own concerns and problems echoed thus (even ones that i was unaware i had until i heard them) was sort of reassuring. And of course we didn't come up with any easy answers to these things; but it's still nice to know that i'm not alone.
While in Pala, we took a couple of little trips that deserve some attention here. First, we went to see what, for many of us, was our first Malaywood (due to the linguistic makeup of the country, each state has its own film industry, Malaywood being Kerala's) movie- Classmates. Classmates is the biggest thing going in Keralan pop culture-- you can't go anywhere without hearing the annoyingly catchy songs from the movie. A three-hour-long spectacle that covers everything from forbidden love to political violence, all taking place at CMS College in Kottayam (where Kyle is working!), Classmates was everything I imagined an Indian movie would be-- it even had the requisite song-and-dance numbers and a we're-having-sex-but-aren't-even-allowed-to-visually-imply-it montage featuring Buddhist monks (hmm.... i didn't think it posible, but it makes even less sense in writing than it did visually). Point being, seeing a Malaywood movie was a very interesting experience and was actually a lot of fun!
The secone trip was to an organization called InFact (Information For Action), a grass-roots farmer's organization that promotes ecologically sound, sustainable organic farming initiatives like multi-cropping and putting emphasis on food crops rather than cash crops. For the last couple of decades, farmers, enticed by lucrative cash crops (rubber, vanilla, pepper) have abandoned food crops, and when the market for these cash crops became completely saturated and prices plummeted, the farmers were left with no income but the same payments to make on their land and equipment. Taking huge loans from banks and other lending agencies, these farmers were driven into insurmountable debt just to survive. With interest rates on loans rising and crop prices dropping even further, many farmers have entirely given up hope, creating an epidemic of suicide amongst farmers all over Southern India. This is a very serious problem, and the people at InFact believe that by focusing on food crops and multi-cropping, farmers can be engaged in practices that are sound both economically and environmentaly. They also organize co-operatives and arrange a sort of bartering network so that there is a guaranteed market for these farmers' excess crops. In all honesty, a lot of these issues are entirely beyond my comprehension but what InFact is promoting sounds like it makes a lot of sense.
As an illustration of what this kind of life can look like, we were taken back to InFact's head, Ronni's, house. On the land around the house, Ronni and his wife and kids grow tapioca, okra, papaya, tomato, ginger, coconut, banana, pepper, vanilla, coffee, rice,and cocoa. Deliberately living a simple, traditional life, they do the majority of cooking over a wood fire, and use either food they've grown themselves or that they've obtained through barter with other local farmers. They are all (the kids included) very deliberate and mindful of everything that they do, and are very clear on why they are living that way. Their young daughter could speak more intelligently than i can about the importance of multi-cropping, biodiversity, and simple living. It was really inspiring to see a whole family united in the beauty of simple, sustainable, mindful living. We ate dinner there, and it was probably the best meal i've ever had.
So take that, you "If It's Good For You, It Probably Tastes Like Poop" naysayers!
All in all, our retreat was a great experience in beautiful surroundings, that provided some badly-needed relaxation and fellowship, and we even learned something!

2006-10-03T08:26:00.000+03:00

Wow, It's October

Well, I've made it through my first full month in India. As you'll probably be able to get a sense of, by reading back through this blog, the first couple of weeks were kind of a whirlwind but i've really started to settle into my new surroundings by now. I've got a pretty healthy but gentle routine and rhythm to my days and weeks that I feel pretty good about. So far it seems like I'm able to balance work and relaxation, socialising and reflecting pretty well. It's been a month of struggles and challenges, of failures and triumphs, some loneliness and lots of new relationships. This has already been a trip of self-discovery and transformation; I'm sure that I'm already a very different person than I was when I left the States.
When I think about the fact that it's October, I realize that in New Jersey the leaves are changing, and a certain smell and chill are entering the air. In Kerala, it's still sunny and warm (it was 85 when I woke up this morning) and green, and that's unlikely to change anytime soon. Autumn has always been my favourite time of year, and when I think about apple- and pumpkin-picking, hot cider, long hikes through the woods near my home, and the million other fond memories and sensory perceptions I have of fall in the northeast US, I start to get a little sad and homesick. But I have to remember that yes, I'm going to be missing fall in New Jersey... but I may never have the opportunity to spend an October in India again! And of course there are things that i could be doing in the States that I'm going to miss out on; memories that I'm not making-- but I'm making memories here that will last a lifetime! I'm doing things here that I would never have had the opportunity to do if I had stayed home. Like I keep saying, I think that if i can hang on to my sense of wonder at being here and make the most out of everything I do, no matter where I am, it'll be a good year and a good life.
But some apple cider sure would be tasty...

2006-09-30T14:28:00.000+03:00

The Dharma of the Present Progressive

In my teaching of communicative English to Indian students,one thing that I keep addressing is the use of the present progressive tense. The prolific use of this tense is one of the identifying characteristics of "Indianized British English." When I have students intruduce themselves, they almost invariably say "My name is ______. I am coming from ______." So in every class, I go over the use of the present progressive. In doing this, I've started noticing some interesting things about it that I'd like to share.
It seems to me that the present progressive can be an interesting (at least to an english major and quasi-Buddhist) meditation. As I sit here typing, I can say, "I am typing." In saying this, I'm indicating that my being ("am"-- a conjugated form of the infinitive "to be") is typing. Put another way, whatever I'm doing in the present progressive is what i "am". So when I'm walking, my whole being should be walking; I'm completely mindful and aware of walking. I'm not occupied by extraneous thoughts or distractions; all i am is the contact between my feet and the ground, the movement of my joints, and the air flowing into and out of my body. When I'm eating, my whole attention is on my food-- its texture in my hand, in my mouth, the act of chewing and swallowing, the way in which, through the digestive process, it becomes part of me. My whole being is the act of walking or eating or breathing.
So in any given moment, look at what you're doing, and make a statement about it in the present progressive tense: "I am typing." "I am reading." "I am playing with my child." "I am talking to a loved one." And become aware of if you really "are" whatever you're doing at the moment. If not, try to bring your full attention to what you're doing and be fully engaged in it.
If what we're doing is harmful or indicative of some negative feeling or fear-- "I am worrying," "I am crying,"--, by bringing awareness and mindfulness to the action, we can get in touch with the underlying emotion and its causes and let our mindfulnes take care of and soothe the fear or pain. No matter what we do, fully experiencing it in the present progressive can put us more in touch with the reality of what is happening.
I know this will sound ridiculous to a lot of people, what with the value we place on multi-tasking and the like. But I think this is an interesting way to look at our language and our lives, and can help to enrich both.

2006-09-28T14:52:00.000+03:00

Teaching English

Part of my job at UC College is to teach classes in communicative English. But it's not like i have a class of my own-- the way it works is that teachers will request for me to come teach communicative English in their class once a week for an unspecified number of weeks. For the last two weeks, I've been doing about 3 classes per week, and have really been struggling and doubting myself.
Modesty aside for the moment, I'm a pretty good teacher-- in front of a class I'm charismatic, entertaining, engaging, and yes, I even manage to get students to learn. But these classes have really been a challenge for me, and the challenge is specifically this: Indian students WILL NOT speak in English in front of other Indians. They all know it; English is mandatory in schools from fourth standard (fourth grade) onward, and many schools are strictly English-language. But the students here are so shy and so afraid of being judged by their peers, that they simply do not speak English in class. When they come up and talk to me on an informal basis outside the classroom (see previous post), they speak in perfectly articulate English and manage to express themselves quite clearly. But getting them to speak in class is like pulling teeth-- harder, in fact. If you pull on a tooth hard enough for long enough, it will eventually budge; not so with these students! And when my plan for teaching them communicative English was to propose a topic of discussion, let the students talk on that topic for a while, and take the last quarter of the class to go over any recurring mistakes in English usage, their staunch refusal to talk proves to be a real hinderance to the learning process.
But I've accepted this as something that's not going to change overnight. So I'm re-evaluating my strategy and am now working on just making the students comfortable enough to talk; or on finding creative and subtle ways of forcing them to talk.
Regardless, my apparent failures in my first few classes really had me down and doubting myself. But I got a nice confidence boost today when the student government body on campus called a strike in the middle of an economics class i was teaching in. Unsure of what to do, I told the students that since I wasn't really sure what was going on or where I stood with regard to the reasons for the strike, I wasn't going to participate; but I also wouldn't stand in the way of anyone who wanted to join the strike and leave class. At this point the actual teacher came in and said that whenever a strike is called (this is apparently a fairly frequent thing) that's it for the day. Classes are cancelled and students either join the march or go home. But the students in this class all said "No, no, no, no. We really want to stay and finish this class!" The teacher was blown away and so was I. Maybe I haven't been doing such a bad job after all.
Incidentally, the strike was called to protest the prohibitively high fees for the self-financing courses the college offers. Most programs at UC College are heavily subsidised by the government so that students enrolled in these programs have to pay virtually nothing for their education. However, this is only true of the general liberal arts and sciences (and those of us with BA's in English know how far that will take you...). The more technical fields that guarantee a job and decent pay (computers, medical, engineering, etc) are all self-financing and are so unbelievably expensive that only the richest of the rich students can afford to take these classes. All of which amounts to making upward mobility for the poor students virtually, if not literally, impossible.

2006-09-25T10:19:00.000+03:00

What Privacy?

The one thing that I've really been struggling with here is the Indian understanding (viz. none at all) of privacy and personal space.
Anyone who knows me at all knows that even though I'm a pretty nice guy, I'm a very private, solitary, introverted person. I really value having time and space for myself, and am very protective of that time and space.
This is completely incomprehensible to the Indian psyche. No Indian I've talked to about this can understand why someone would ever want to be alone; to spend time by himself. Even worse, should an Indian find you doing anything by yourself (walking, reading, playing guitar, meditating), they assume that something must be wrong- if you're alone, you must be terribly depressed- and lavish even more attention on you.
I speak not from broad generalisation, but from personal experience. Many's the day when I've been enjoying a few moments of quiet reflection in my room or sitting on my bed, happily playing my guitar, when an unexpected guest will drop by and ask if I'm feeling OK. "Yes, I'm doing quite well.... why do you ask?" "Well you were sitting all lonely..." I find it meaningful that in Indian English, "lonely" and "alone" mean exactly the same thing. Or when I'm walking to the college, engrossed in my thoughts or focusing on my breathing and footsteps as a way of meditation, it's all I can do to not scream when someone I've never met before will invariably come up beside me and start chatting like he's known me for years.
I guess this is something I'll just have to get used to. And I guess it's sort of a blessing that I'll never be allowed to feel lonely. But as of right now, I find this absolutely intolerable!

2006-09-19T09:42:00.000+03:00

A Small Triumph

At dinner last night, I was talking to my friend Philip Koshy (retiree, mealtime-buddy, and very high in the running for "Coolest Old Guy Ever") and asking him for some words in Malayalam (sadly, the titular small triumph overshadowed the words I was learning and now I can't remember them!). He told me one of them, followed quickly by "But you won't be able to say it." for this word contained the Malayalam letter (i wish i could type in Malayalam to show it!) that is most often transliterated as "zh." Allegedly the toughest sound for a Westerner to master, this letter occupies a sort of gray area between an "r" and an "l," made by sort of rolling your tongue in the back of your throat without it really touching anything.
To Philip's astonishment, I repeated the word perfectly, "zh" included. He clapped and cheered, "Hey, you got it!"
He doesn't have to know that I had been taught the sound a week earlier and had spent several hours practicing it.
A win's a win.

2006-09-18T20:06:00.000+03:00

Rules for Survival

1) SMILE-- when people stare, point, laugh, leer, jeer, or shout things i don't understand at me, rather than getting paranoid, fearful, angry, or withdrawn, I'll make eye contact, smile, and wave or bow or whatever.

2) LAUGH-- As i adapt to a totally new culture and way of life, many things i do (or try to do and fail spectacularly at...) will be funny to those around me. People regularly laugh at my attempts to eat with just the fingers of the right hand; at my efforts toward speaking Malayalam. And i'll grant that the sight of a grown man from the world's great superpower struggling to get rice from the plate to his mouth is probably nigh hilarious. So I have to remember to not take myself too seriously and always be willing to see myself as other see me and to laugh at that image when it's amusing.

3) BE GRATEFUL-- No matter how bad things seem, or how hard they get, or how much I'm struggling, I need to find something to be grateful for. If i ever get sick of my room, I need to remember that there are those very nearby (maybe a couple hundred meters) who don't have a private room or a bed or electricity or a bathroom with running water. Even in this small room, I am very fortunate and privileged to have the living situation I do, and I can't forget that. If i ever get tired of the food here, I need to remember those (also very nearby) who get less to eat in an entire day than i do at one meal, and be thankful for the food that i get. No matter how bad things get, there's always something to be thankful for. And these reflections should also be jumping off points for offering whatever i can of my time, resources, and self to those nearby people.

2006-09-17T21:52:00.000+03:00

A Devotion I Found Relevant...
"Our personal experience and understanding of Christ is a limited one. We therefore need the faith and understanding of other Christians- and particularly those from other cultures- to enrich our own. We constantly run the danger of making Christ in our own image and of subjecting what Christ tells us to the constraints and concerns of our own culture. In doing this we run the danger that we only possess the Christ who suits us and serves our ends. If we are to possess Christ more fully or rather, if he is to possess us, we need to embracethe Christ who is for us but who also calls our values into question."

Above and beyond learning from other Christians, I feel like there is a lot from other faith traditions in other cultures that can enrich our own faith and practice; and that is part of the reason I'm here, or at least part of what I hope to get out of this year. In Kerala, Christianity (Catholicism, Protestantism, Syrian Orthodox, Mar Thoma, Jacobite, Pentecostal, Evangelical), Hinduism and Islam all co-exist in a very healthy environment with a lot of cross-pollination of rituals and symbols, and all are mutually enriched by the presence and influenceof the others.
Also important in this devotion is the distinction between an affirmative personal Christ, and a Christ who challenges us. Maybe 'distinction' isn't the right word, since both aspects exist together and should work simultaneously in our lives. But the current trend, I fear, is to emphasize the former to the near-exclusion of the latter. Yes, Christ is for us (so who can be against us?), but He is also for everyone else-- especially those who we (in our self-righteousness, assured that if Christ is for Us, then he must be against Them) hate or ignore. This can be an uncomfortable thought, but sit with it for a while.

2006-09-17T19:35:00.000+03:00

Helpful Bible Verses

I Thessalonians 5:14-21
"... encourage the timid, help the weak, be patient with everyone. Make sure that nobody pays back wrong for wrong, but always try to be kind to each other and everyone else.
Be joyful always; pray continually; give thanks in all circumstances, for this is God's will for you in Christ Jesus.
Do not put out the Spirit's fire;... Test everything. Hold onto the good. Avoid every kind of evil."

This seems to be really good advice for my year here, and for life-- especially the middle part. If i can always be joyful, pray continually, and give thanks in all circumstances, i think i'll be doing extremely well. It's easy to be joyful and to give thanks when things are going well, or when things are easy. But when we struggle or when we're doubting God or ourselves, or when things really seem to suck, i think we need to acknowledge these challenges as opportunities for growth and transformation, and give thanks for them and be grateful. These times are just like a tattoo-- yeah, they hurt like hell when we're going through them, but we can get something really beautiful out of them. And it might not even have to be that drastic. Maybe we don't have to give thanks and be joyful when we're suffering. But if, in those times, we can find something, anything to be thankful for, we'll be doing pretty well. For instance. even though i was struggling and feeling really afraid and alone the other day, I went for a run and used that as a way of giving thanks for the miracle of this body that i've been blessed with (which is certainly not to say that i have a particularly astonishing physique. the human body is just an amazing pieceof machinery). and giving thanks for something is much better than thinking that everything is crap.
and i really like the advice "Test everything. Hold onto the good." Here, we're encouraged to push our limits, try new things, take chances. Don't stick with what you know to be safe. Be willing to try anything. But only hold onto the good. Pretty good advice, i think.

2 Corinthians 4:6-something
"For God, who said, "Let light shine out of the darkness," made his light shine in our hearts to give us the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ.
But we have this treasure in jars ofclay to show that this all-surpassing power is from God, and not from us. We are hard pressed on every side, but not crushed; perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not abandoned; struck down, but not destroyed."

I love the image of the jars of clay. none of us is a suitable or worthy vessel for God's message and love. None of us is deserving of God's unconditional love. Whenever I think i'm not good enough or strong enough to really follow Christ, I'm right- I'm not. But that's the mystery of grace. Even though we are flawed and broken and completely undeserving, God still fills us with his light and love and trusts us to bear these gifts to other flawed, broken people. And it's the idea of Bonhoeffer's "God at the gaps"-- where we fall short is where God is manifest in our lives. But this is a costly grace; it costs us nothing less than our lives and our selves. To live in Christ and to accept God's grace fully is to deny ourselves, take up our crosses, and follow Him. When Jesus called the first disciples, "Come, follow me," they left their nets behind-- their jobs, livelihoods, families, identities, selves-- and followed him. And we're all called to do the same-- to leave our selves behind and follow Christ, even to the cross (why else would we have to carry them with us on this journey?). and only then, once we are willing to give our whole selves and our whole lives to God-in-Christ, have we fully accepted this costly grace.

2006-09-16T11:31:00.000+03:00

UC College and Chacko Homes

Since I've been here for kind of a while already, I may as well try to describe a bit about where I am.
I'm going to spend the better part of this year working at Union Christian College. Founded in 1921, UC College is the first Christian college founded as an Indian initiative (all the others-- and there are a lot of them-- were the work of European missionaries). And while it is a Christian college, its spirit of ecumenism is manifest in its acceptance of students and staff of any religion. a college of Mahatma Gandhi University, UCC was visited by Gandhiji (-ji is a suffix added to a name to denote profound respect) in 1925. During this visit, he planted a mango tree in front of the administrative building and signed the guest register "Delighted with the ideal situation. MK Gandhi." The principal (what we would call the President-- except the principal is elected from amongst the faculty for a 5 year term) of the college showed me the actual page in the register. Gandhi had terrible handwriting!
At UCC, I'll be supervised my Mr. Cherian George, the head librarian, as I help to publish the annual college newsletter, research and write up an "official" history of the college, and teach fairly regular communicative English classes as well as getting involved in life on campus however else i can. Cherian is a relatively young member of the staff, and a super-nice guy. He's very patient and accomodating with all of my ridiculous questions and needs, and really goes out of his way to help this poor lost American out.

I'm currently staying at Chacko Homes (KC Chacko was the founder of the college and many nearby institutions, so lots of things are named after him), a retirement home that's a five minute walk from the campus. contrary to what my previous post seems to indicate, Chacko Homes is actually a lovely place, and I'm very happy there so far. I have a small but comfortable room with a private, "Western" bathroom (meaning that there's a toilet that i can sit down on rather than a hole in the ground-- but still no toilet paper!-- and a shower head [of course there's no separate shower stall or bathtub, so the floor of my bathroom is constantly wet. but it's still better than bathing with a bucket of water. and, since Indian people really have no use for hot water- why would anyone want to deliberately make themselves warm??-, showers are very cold in the morning. by the afternoon, the water tanks on top of the roof have warmed up sufficiently for my second shower of the day-- i sweat a lot!!-- to be pretty comfortable.]). the Home is made up of two residential buildings connected by the dining hall. each residential building is square with a central courtyard open to the air, and the old folks spend a lot of time walking laps around the courtyard. the people at Chacko Homes are extremely nice, and are quite used to having a young American around by now, so they are very warm and welcoming, and really go out of their way to make me feel at home.
So while I do get lonely at times, I am really quite happy with where I'll be for the year. and i've started running in the evenings and walking after dinner, so my free time is getting a bit more structure, which i think can only be a good thing!

2006-09-15T12:11:00.000+03:00

Welcome to my blog!

I'm starting up this blog in order to record my thoughts, struggles, triumphs, and experiences during the year I will be in India.

If you're here reading this, chances are you already know to a certain extent who I am, what I'm doing, and why I'm here. In the event that you don't, here is a brief summary.

I'm Andy Smith, 25 years old, from New Jersey. Now serving as a Young Adult Volunteer of the Presbyterian Church (USA), I'll be spending the next year in the state of Kerala in Southern India. In Kerala, I'll be living and working in the town of Aluva (pronounced and often spelled "Alwaye") at a place called Union Christian College. My job here is mostly to just be a presence on campus and engage the students in conversation, thus increasing their competence and confidence in spoken English.

I have journal entries dating back almost to the day I got here (in fact, starting before!), so I'm going to be back-dating a bunch of entries. After this initial confusion, however, I will keep this bad boy as up-to-date as possible.

So, if you are at all curious about life in Southern India-- people, customs, religion, food, music-- or if you just want to hear some entertaining stories about an American dude trying to survive in a different culture, or occasionally want to hear some theological musings from one who can't even pretend to have any expertise in the field, you are invited to check back here as often as you please. I'd be happy to have you!

2006-09-14T22:27:00.000+03:00

Some Cool Quotes From Gandhi...

"I have been convinced... that human nature is much the same, no matter under what clime it flourishes, and that if you approach people with trust and affection, you would have ten-fold trust and thousand-fold affection returned to you."

"I have no special revelation of God's will. He reveals himself daily to every human being, but we shut our ears to the 'still small voice'... God never appears to you in person, but in action."

2006-09-12T19:30:00.000+03:00

What's the Problem Here??
(back-dated post #7)
I won't lie.. i'm lonely right now, and scared. and i'm wondering how i'll ever make it through this year.
Today was my first at Union Christian College, where I'll be doing most of my work this year. It seems like a nice enough place, and it sounds like there'll be plenty to keep me busy there. Everyone I've met is very friendly and seems more than willing to welcome and befriend me. I think I'll be very happy there. Plus, internet-connected computers are everywhere on campus, so i'll be able to feel at least a little connected to my loved ones back home.
I get into trouble when i return to Chacko Homes (the retirement home where I'm staying-- which is, also, a very nice place with very friendly and loving people-- more on UC College, Chacko homes, and the people at both later... just let me whine for now...) in the evening. These last couple of days, there's been a span of between 2 and 3 hours before dinner and maybe 1-2 hours between dinner and bed (dinner is eaten late here-- 8-9pm) where i have nothing to do. I come to my room, play the guitar, read, write, and get really homesick. I start to feel really lonely and wonder how i'm going to make it through a whole year.
But i'm a very solitary, independent creature by nature-- so what's the problem here?!?!? My hope is that over the course of the year (and hopefully sooner rather than later!) I'll get into a routine where i can stay busy and sociable, but still treasure my quiet solitary time. I know that a daily period of quiet, reflection, Bible study, prayer, and relaxation is an important component of a succesful and happy year (life?). I just hope i can get over my fears, doubts, anxieties, and loneliness so that i can appreciate the quiet time for the blessing it is.

Prayer
Gracious Father, thank you for your constant and loving presence in my life. through my greatest joys, my darkest fears, my deepest loneliness, my loudest doubts, you have always been with me. Forgive my uncomprehending loneliness and fear. I know that you are with me always-- so what do i have to be afraid of? Lord, help me to entrust myself completely to you; that your will, your love, your light can shine clearly through me. Let my hours of solitude be a time of communion with you. You sent your Son into the world so that we would know we are never alone. and i know that no matter where i am or how alone i feel, I am loved, and I am never alone.

2006-09-07T17:00:00.000+03:00

Onam!!
(back-dated post #6)

We arrived in Kerala just in time for Onam. One of the biggest holidays on the Keralan calendar, Onam is a ten-day-long celebration of the annual return to earth of the beloved mythical ruler, Mahabali. Legend has it that Mahabali was a good, kind, and generous ruler who was beloved by his people. Somehow, he offended the gods and was banished from the earth. But because he was such a swell guy, he is allowed to return for ten days each year. To celebrate the return of Mahabali, students get off from school, fancy meals are eaten, new clothes are bought, and the ground is decorated with brightly coloured floral carpets called attapu.
On Monday, Achen took us out for an Onam lunch at a nice restaurant. the meal was a duplicate of the other traditional meals we had eaten (at the wedding and at lunch on Sunday), but no less fantastic. Since that time we have been transferred from Achen's care to that of his friend and colleague, Joy Joseph, and have moved from the luxury of Achen's house in Aluva to the prison-cell-like cloisters of the Amos Center in Kottayam. Here, we've been blessed to work with Chacko (Jacob) and Anne, and Steve (their 8 year old son), who have been teaching us how to teach English to Malayalees. As a sort of fun activity this afternoon, we created an attapu together. The meditative tedium of pulling the petals off of thousands of flowers. the impossible precision of colouring "inside the lines" with those petals as a medium. The amazement at the beauty of our finished product. If you've never made an attapu, do it. There's nothing quite as beautiful (I hope i can get some pictures of our attapu....)
Happy Onam

2006-09-04T08:00:00.000+03:00

A Quick Note On Architechture...
(back-dated post #5)

What I described of the auditorium in Tiruvella seems pretty typical of Indian architechture and construction. Buildings, even the interior, are made almost exclusively of bare concrete and tile (as i imagine wood or drywall or carpet would warp and/or moulder in the 97% humidity present most days), and every light i've seen has been flourescent. This lends every building, be it a home, office, shop, school, or hospital, a more-than-vaguely-institutional air. I found this rather alarming at first, but am starting to adjust to it, i think. and what these buildings lack in western warmth and charm, they make up for with strict efficiency-- nothing in Indian construction is superfluous; everything seems to serve some purpose. So these buildings are not pretty or "nice" by Western standards, but they get the job done. Which is, I suppose, the point after all.

2006-09-04T07:48:00.000+03:00

Outings, etc.
(back-dated post #4)

I think we're all settling into life in Kerala by now. Our lives are taking on a new rhythm-- in general much slower and more relaxed. Which isn't to say that we haven't done a lot since we got here five days ago. We've all eagerly begun learning Malayalam-- starting with a few important phrases (nani [thank you], mathi ["enough"-- used frequently at meals], vellam venam [i'd like water], toilet evide ana [where is the toilet?]) and now backtracking to learn the alphabet and different sounds of the letters. Being here is like being an infant again. The most basic things need to be relearned from scratch-- how to eat, how to speak, how to dress, how to go to the bathroom. and in five days, i think we've all made remarkable progress in all these fields. We've also had daily bible studies, lectures on current issues and history in India and Kerala, and taken a few outings:
Friday and Saturday we were in the town of Tiruvella, about three hours away, at a meeting of the Student Christian Movement of India. Achen was sort of the keynote speaker and we were invited to accompany him. We stayed at some kind of Catholic boarding house/conference center and took meals at the refectory. The meeting was held at a nearby Christian college and was attended by approximately 50 college students from all over Kerala. The meeting was held in a small concrete box of a building with a blackboard, some plastic deck chairs, and a few ceiling fans-- nothing like what an American would identify as a conference hall or auditorium! During breaks in the programme and during meals, we were encouraged to socialize with the students, and we each joined a small group to discuss the negative effects of globalisation in Kerala. I'm not an outgoing person at all, but the socialising proved no problem at all-- like at the wedding, Indian kids were lined up and crowded around to talk to us; again, mostly to practice their English, but also because most of these kids had only seen white people on TV and were honestly fascinated by us. The talk about globalisation was much less forthcoming. the kids in my group only wanted to hear my opinions on the matter. I was only interested to hear what they had to say, but shared my thoughts as a way of opening the conversation up. But still, no one was willing to share. When I outright asked for their thoughts, the one fellow who spoke English well said that Indians like America very much-- we're very generous and have done a lot to help India. They then went on to ask me what i like about Kerala, and what its "demerits" are. After my cursory answers, the students began talking amongst themselves in Malayalam, and seemed to be engaged in some serious discussion, so i asked for a translation. I was told that they were discussing how the dropping prices of agricultural products were driving many farmers into debt, and was actually creating a suicide epidemic. I was (and still am, honestly) kind of frustrated that they weren't willing share these thoughts with me. they just thought I wanted to hear how great they think America is. I think one of my great challenges for the year will be to get people to relate to me not as an American, but as simply another person.
This whole trip ended up being a very interesting exercise in communication. Having to introduce and talk about myself, explain my tattoo, and discuss globalisation in short, simple sentences using short, clear words really forced me to be deliberate and think about exactly what i wanted to communicate so that i could express it as clearly as possible.
The next day (Sunday) we attended Achen's church and introduced ourselves to the congregation. Men and women sat on opposite sides of the sanctuary and the service was entirely in Malayalam, but other than that it was more or less the same as church anywhere. Both at the church and the conference, we brought the guitar (Binu's-- Achen's son's-- guitar, since mine was still lost somewhere between London and Cochin) and performed "Ninte Hitham," a song in Malayalam that Achen had taught us. Our attempts at Malayalam were (and still are) a great source of entertainment to everyone, but i think they secretly respect the attempt we're making to learn their language.
After church, we went out to lunch and had another traditional banana-leaf meal and proceded on to Kodanadu, a sort of zoo where elephants are domesticated and trained to carry wood and other jobs. We all rode an elephant, took pictures with some elephants, went goggle-eyed over baby elephnats (chained to stakes in the ground....), and checked out a small zoo with monkeys, crocodiles, snakes, deer, and various kinds of birds. But the most interesting part of the day was a brief conversation with a man named Joshi (Joshua). Joshi spoke very little English. I spoke even less Malayalam, but we seemed to understand each other anyway. when i told him i was from America, he said, holding up his index finger "Ah, America number one. Too big ego. world police. Christian, Hindu, Muslim... too much killing. Is no good." "No good," i agreed, shaking my head sadly, "too much killing. too much hate." Joshi grabbed my shoulder. "Brother."

2006-08-31T13:00:00.000+03:00

Hindu Wedding
(back-dated post #3)

Well it's only our first full day in India and we already got to go to a Hindu wedding. It was held at a small temple that is apparently the oldest in the Aluva/Cochin area. This temple is dedicated to the Hindu earth goddess (whose name eludes me at the moment) and Ganesh (the elephant-headed god of good fortune and protection). The wedding itself was actually very short-- the bride's mother lit a bunch of lamps and poured a large basket of grain into a smaller container, causing it to overflow. This gesture, from what I understand, is a symbol of abundance. The priest said a few prayers and presented the groom with a necklace (thali) that he put on the bride, and that was pretty much it. The rest of the time at the temple was just for photo-ops. We even had our picture taken with the happy couple!
Then was the reception. the brief ceremony was acted out again on the stage of the large reception hall, and then it was time to eat! We had a traditional festal meal served on a banana leaf with a number of sides (hot, pungent, sweet, and every flavour in between) ranged around a mound of rice. You kind of mix/mush the sides into the rice and form it into neat little balls and pop them into your mouth, all with the fingers of the right hand. Also served were two thick, hot, sweet drinks called payasam; one was brown and made from boiled wheat and sugar. The other was made from rice, milk, and sugar, and was white. Everything was delicious; this would probably be pretty high in the running for Best Meal Ever, if i was the kind of person who kept track of things like that.
Both the wedding and the reception were accompanied by music: one guy played this really long recorder/clarinet thing, and another played some kind of double-sided drum. One side, played with the fingers, almost sounded like a wood-block. The other side was pounded with a stick and provided a more resonant bass sound. the music was very lively and frenetic, and sounded mostly improvisational-- the nearest comparison i could make was to jazz. (I was later informed that the music was not at all improvisational, but is in fact highly structured-- the rhythm of the drum dictates the melody that the recorder guy would play. This is fascinating and something that I'll definitely have to look into further!)
But it was strange. We were given more attention than the bride and groom. People moved out of our way so that we would have the best possible view of the wedding, and we were given the best seats at the feast. The bride's mother told us what an honor it was to have us attend. People were lining up to talk to us; to practice their English on us ("What is your name?" "My name is..." How are you?" "Where are you from?") We were totally guests of honor and centers of attention which, like i said, was weird. But it was still a beautiful and exhilirating celebration and an awesome first exposure to Kerala.

2006-08-30T13:30:00.000+03:00

First Impressions
Mumbai Airport, 1:30 pm
(back-dated entry #2, while on the plane from Mumbai to Cochin)

After our bagage debacle (more on that later), we had to get from International Arrivals to Domestic Departures, which it seems are on opposite sides of the city. To do this, we had to take a pre-paid cab through Mumbai (or, if you like, Bombay). Based solely on that 15 minute cab ride, India so far is everything I've heard it was. It's hot. It's humid. It's dirty. It smells. It's loud. It's crowded. It's amazing. Even though all the structures were either brown or gray or covered with dust, the clothes and signs and billboards were vibrant technicolor. the sacred and the profane exist in such close proximity that it's hard to tell the difference. On a building's concrete facade, Hindu deities and campaigning politicians vie for space. On the street below, a man unzips his pants and relieves himself directly into the open sewer system. Like i said, it smells. Once outside the airport buildings, one is knocked senseless by the smell (if it's possible to be knocked senseless by sensory overload...); the smell of waste, of people, of wasted people. Yes, discarded trash and people line the streets of Mumbai. Nestled against the outer walls of the airport was an improvisational town composed of tents made from plastic tarps, where naked children cavorted with stray dogs. Women sat on the ground in a semi-circle, happily talking about whatever it is women talk about when they sitin a semi-circle. I've spent plenty of time in various US cities, done mission work with some of the porest of America's poor. But I've never been confronted with poverty so blatant- so out-in-the-open-- or so prevalent before. I can only interpret these signs to say "get used to it. this is simply the way it is." And i'm not trying here to suggest that poverty and oppression as the status quo are acceptable. In a culture where these things have been entrenched so firmly for so long, the struggle for change is going to be that much harder.
But I'm not here to fight.
I'm not here to impose my ideals and ideas of Good and Bad, Right and Wrong onto Indian culture.
I'm here to observe, to experience, to share in that culture. and with God's grace, I'll be able to be open and receptive to what this culture has to teach me, and learn to work for change-- not to fight for it.

2006-08-28T14:28:00.000+03:00

Fears and Faith
Chicago, IL, USA
(back-dated post #1, written on the afternoon before i boarded the plane for India)

This is really (finally?) happening. Denial is no longer an option. I now find myself face-to-face with the facts of a trip that will last for more than a day, and a year in India. My feelings right now are pretty much indecipherable. I'm excited. I'm afraid. I'm curious. I'm anxious. I'm lonely.
I know that what I'm doing is good, that it's right for this time in my life, that it's amazing. I'm doing something that very few people ever really get to do-- I'm living out what I really believe to be God's call for me.
But I can't help but wonder-- am i good enough? smart enough? brave enough? strong enough? am i enough??
Will I be able to deal with the doubt? the loneliness? the isolation? All I have right now are these questions, doubts, and fears.
I guess I just have to have faith, and trust that God knows what he's doing...