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I apologize for the lack of updates! Between internet issues and having no time, we’ve gotten very little blogging done. Anyway, I’m posting up what we have so far. It will be intermittent at best over the rest of the trip, so not a lot changing!

See you guys in a while.

PS. Important phrases: “Thank You, Come Again”, “Think About It”, and “Cow Juice”

We left by train to the town…in the province. I was confused for a bit there. Anyway, the train ride overnight was great and our nearness to the first class train car meant a break from being incessantly woken up to be asked if I wanted “Chai! Coffee!” that tends to go on ALL NIGHT LONG on the trains last time around…

Anyway, this place is a typical Indian town, which means it’s about 100,000 people packed into a very small area about 15 minutes away from the place before it. The difference this time around is that the area is almost entirely Hindu (Aside from the orphanage, there is only one family of believers). Coupled with the fact that the a Hindu political party with hardline views on other religions and outsiders being fairly strong in the area, it’s made for some fairly tense moments.

The hotel isn’t nearly as bad as Mike made it sound, the Pastor’s wife and the two other women that live here are absolutely amazing cooks, and there haven’t been any openly hostile moments, so thus far, it’s absolutely amazing!

Anyway, more later.

It’s the city “featured” in the documentary/photojournal “Born into Brothels”. I’ve been told it’s one of the worst cities in the world. It has less people than Mumbai, yet seems more desperate. It’s also home to the Bible Society, which is integral in making large quantities of Bibles and other things available for very cheap prices, and the Pastor’s orphanage with 26 kids.

This particular orphanage consists largely of the children of prisoners at the federal prison. This is the worst prison in India, extremely tough and considered worse than the notorious Soviet Gulags, so the chances of these children ever seeing their parents again are very slim. The pastor is currently trying to remove a couple of children who were imprisoned with their mother when there was no one to care for them.

The orphanage is situated right next to a stagnant pond covered in green scum, and there’s a very small plot of open land nearby. We took the children to play in the little lot for a while, and one of the neighbors remarked that this was the first time the children had been permitted to play there. I don’t know whether it was the pastor or the land owner that usually did not give permission, but our presence caused a concession to the norm.

The kids were fantastic! Warm and friendly; very chatty though you just had to shrug and nod your head. It’s slightly frustrated to have a seven year old girl chattering her head off at you and the only word you understand is “Uncle”. It seems that fewer children speak English this time around.

While we were there, we also spoke to some of the locals. One of them, a young muslim man named (or something like that!) was extremely friendly. We were able to speak to him some about God and what we believed. It was interesting to hear his views, which I’m sure weren’t entirely muslim, and be able to share Jesus with him. He didn’t get it, but he was open to speaking of it, which is possibly a huge step. He is close friends with the pastor’s son, so I am hopeful that he will see the work being done and come to know the Truth.

I’ve not had time really to blog or journal until now (read: “I’ve been horribly lazy and gone to bed as soon as I got back to the hotel.”). I actually had about 5 paragraphs written out before when Sam accidentally unplugged the computer. I think I cried.

Anyway, this has been a really different trip from the last time. I mean, much of the same things I saw last time are the same; desperate poverty, trash everywhere, extremely dirty conditions, and a culture that uses it’s gods to shill candy bars. However, being based out of a single location and doing day trips to really rural areas has been amazing.

Before, in southern India, even the “rural” areas were in very populated areas. Here in West Bengal, we’ve been to mud hut villages in the middle of huge fields of rice patties. Mike explained it best: “Apocalypse Now”. The villages are very tribal, the towns (by town, I mean 100,000 people) very compact and worn down. Where there is power, there are rolling black outs or brown outs, but most of the places we have gone do not have power.

One thing is the same though: The children. Sure, they speak a different language and hardly any of them speak English. They all speak the language of football (non-american), Cricket (I still don’t get it) or tag. They’re also as cute as it gets and quite affectionate once they warm up to you.

I think Meredith is trying to find ways to smuggle a couple back with her.

PS. Thank You. Come Again.

They tell you that once you go, you’re changed forever and I went to India expecting some earth shattering revelation. I am ever one for overblown expectations. The thing about India is that it does change you forever, but not often in some epiphany of divine communication. I’m sure some people get that, but I have yet to be that guy.

The changes it wrought were mostly small, yet deep seated, changes that are singularly more significant than any Mac truck force realization could have been. I find myself awake, alive and with a deeper understanding of what God intended for us to be. I feel more focused and more at peace than I have ever felt. I found my faith shaken to the core, not by disappointment, but by the clear demonstration of the absolute pettiness of the concerns or worries that held me back.

There is no way to truly put into words the things that you see on a trip like this. You cannot communicate the years of pain, betrayal and need behind a child’s smile; perfectly relay the stories of sacrifice, loss and faith in the face of amazing adversity; you cannot understand it on a visceral level until you’re looking that person in the eye and stand in their environment. Disconnecting from the fog of your own perceptions is a truly impossible task until you understand how truly distant you are from your own definitions of comfort and safety, pain and adversity.

We spoke to a child that lived in a train station and ate food from garbage cans; watched a man who had saddled himself with immense debt to care for 15 children weep as months of prayer came to fruition at the very last moment on a happenstance encounter with our team erased it all and gave him money to continue. We heard from a pastoral student that had no place to live, no email address, no phone number, nothing, yet he rejoiced that he could walk the streets and preach the gospel; sat with a pastor that had started his school, church and orphanage in a town that he chose because they had just burned thousands of bibles and witnessed his unshakable faith that God would provide.

In the face of incomprehensible conditions, real persecution, and a seemingly impossible task of changing the course and culture of a country of 1.4 billion people, men and women are stepping out to “suffer with Christ” not just for a couple of weeks or months, but for years or whole lifetimes. Children are being saved from the streets, people are coming to know Christ, and God is moving the impossible to the possible in increments.

I spent much of my life disenchanted with Christianity because of the hypocrisy and pettiness of many of the Christians I encountered as a Pastor’s Kid. At one point, I felt that God was a crutch used to hold up feeble hatreds, justified “us and them” mentalities, and make “train wreck” people feel good about themselves while changing nothing. I had already abandoned much of that thinking as youthful angst, but in India, all I could hear was God in the back of my head saying “Do you see now? Do you see what it’s all about? Do you see what it means to suffer and why it’s considered glory? Do you still think I’m a crutch?” I was crushed and humbled.

I still don’t know all the changes it wrought in me, but it’s coming together. I went to India looking for answers. I came back with those and more questions still. Yet I know this: I am wired for this. I am more alive today than I was a month ago, and I have had any idea that what God might ask of me being too difficult shattered into tiny pieces. I do not know if that will lead me back to India on a less temporary basis or if it will lead to something else. I just know that God answered my question of Purpose; it is the form in which that purpose will be realized that I have yet to see.

I’ll leave it on one last note. If none of that had happened, if it had been just a trip to another place to do some things, and life was not changed in any tangible way, this one moment alone would have accounted for every penny spent and every moment surrendered. If ever there is a moment where you know you’re seeing God in all of his glory doing exactly what he promised he would do, it is this:

After going through thousands of photos, I have selected 99 that I felt best represented the trip. These were the ones that popped out at me and do not include many shots not directly related to the work. I may add more in the future as I get more time to look at the TONS of them that I have.

All of the photos in this batch were photographed by Mary Lyon. Kelly Morrell and Tia Longhouser may have photos they want to put up but I haven’t had a chance to see them yet.

i58 Projects in India - September 2006

Finally, a little bit of the video that was taken. Kelly Morrell shot this with her digital camera:

Her name. She didn’t know how old she is or how long she’d been there. All she knew was her name and where she’d come from. When they found her, she was immaciated, filthy,sick and near death. She looked like something out of a WWII concentration camp film clip, nothing but skin and bones.

It was the first real look for us at the reality that is this place. Millions live like this…no concept of time, no family, moving from place to place eating garbage until they’re too old or too sick and finally starve to death, alone and unnoted. No one has cared for Reba her entire life, she has no family, only barely even has a name, and now that someone cared enough to notice, it is probably too late.

When the girls reported her to the school, they agreed to take her in. There was no hesitation or grudging cooperation. They simply did. Mary bathed her, one of the girls at the school fed her, and the team prayed for her.

We don’t know what will happen. They said they would care for her until she was healthy enough to decide what to do or she died. We’re praying that she will become a story that exalts God’s glory, rather than a story that rends hearts. It is in his hands.

All I know is that unlike the millions of others, her life will not pass unnoticed. I will never forget what very little I learned of her.

Ok, so it’s been a bit of a delay. There wasn’t an opportunity to really do anything since the last time. Tia was willing to stay up late to post the other night on the hotel’s one dial-up computer, but I don’t think anyone else had enough energy left. Probably has a lot to do with no one else having a chai tea addiction.

For the record: Chai Tea in the US is total garbage.

Anyway! This place is now probably one of my favorite places ever. It reminds me of Colorado Springs with a sub-tropical climate. Mountains, waterfalls, a constant breeze, and about 56 orphans plus an additional 65 Bible College students.

The first thing I noticed was that the “feel” of the place was different from the others. To me, it seemed warmer than the rest, with more of a family feel. This is not to say that the others were not. The others were all great places that worked very hard to be the family those kids don’t have.

I think it boiled down to a couple things. The pastor and his wife.

The Pastor was a very affectionate, “you’re here so you’re family” kind of guy prone to bad jokes and huge bear hugs. He fed us (oh man, did they feed us…if you visit, eat slowly. He figures a plate that is less than full needs more food on it!), he actually put us to work (100kg bags of rice are heeeeavy) and he introduced us to just about every kid that wandered by. Many of the children would walk up and grab his hand or hide behind him while they peaked around at us. None of the children at his orphanage have anyone to claim them, so he introduced each as his own.

The other thing was his wife. She is the Doctor’s daughter, looks a lot like her mother, and is an amazing woman. She was fantastic, and as I understand it, pretty much runs the place. We learned that she practically raised another Pastor from 5 to adulthood and it was obvious as you quickly saw where he got many of the traits that we love about him. It would make sense that, having been in this since the beginning, she would be a big piece of the orphanage she runs.

Both of them are extremely solid christians that seem to have no doubt whatsoever in God’s support of their work. There was no mention of money, no expression of concern of the future despite growing debts, and they expressed that their ministry had been built on faith in God’s goodness and would continue to be. Samgeorge said that he came with a small vision of 5 or 6 students and a few orphans and God had made something much, much bigger.

The stories here were amazing…I wish we’d had more time to hear them. They got children out of train stations, a couple newborns (one only 3 days old), and even a child left unclaimed at the hospital for 3 months after she was born. We didn’t even get a chance to get into the bible school students stories, but you could tell just by looking at their faces that there were all kinds of backgrounds in that group.

It was a great time with more kids, some college age kids, and I honestly think I could spend months there. I didn’t get the chance to do more than play with some of the kids, learn a few names, and speak (again), but the place just…clicked with me. I enjoyed my time immensely and didn’t want to leave. If I had to pick a place to spend months at, this would most definitely be it.

So we got here last night after a long, and yet again, much delayed train ride. This time in 3rd class, which is 3 bunks high instead of two. However, aside from a single incident brought on largely by poor understanding, the people were really cool and we met a couple of locals.

One thing was interesting was that we met a small boy, 5-6 years old (though he claimed to be 300!), that lived in the train station. He hung out with us quietly, ate chips, drank sprite, and played with Allison’s uno cards while we waited for the train. I wish I could remember his name, but Tia has his name written down. Hopefully, she will relate some of his story as she interviewed him and Mary got pictures. He was a good kid with an easy smile and seemed quite content with just being near us.

The hotel is a bit sketchy, but it looks like we may move to another one that’s much nicer and only 5 minutes from the orphanage (instead of 45), so I’m happy. Even if we don’t move, it’s not too bad. Just very loud and without hot water, and quite below the standards of most americans…Veer also has recommended we not eat there, so we’ve walked down the road to a much nicer place for meals. haha We missed a really nice hotel by about 150ft…and the price differences are insane. A nice hotel here is about 1750 rupees a night. That equates out to about $40-$45 US. Often, the price difference between “nice”and “scary” is about $5.

We went over to the Pastor’s orphanage today. He has about 125 kids. We only got to introduce ourselves before they had to run off to school, but it was very cool. The kids gave us real flower lei’s though I don’t know what they call them here. The Pastor says that about 70% of the children are true orphans, while the other 30% are from broken homes or abandoned. It’s hard to imagine, really.

He also has a school for the younger orphans and accepts children from the surrounding area. He only charges 100 rupees as school fees for the local children and his teachers work for a lower than normal wage. It’s very cool to see the “complete” product that was only a foundation and some walls last year…well, complete in the sense that he’s designed it to be able to build up to 3 stories, but it only has one.

Down here, they don’t speak Hindi (almost at all) so they brought in another pastor from over 125km away to translate for us. That pastor also has need. I don’t know if there is anything we can do, but I hope so.

I’m on a 30 minute timer and I don’t have a lot to say right now as most of our time since last was travel. Hopefully I will have more to say later, once we’ve had a chance to hang out with the kids a bit. Today was school for them and market day for us. I want to get the kids some backpacks as many were running around with broken zippers or bags almost too small to carry their books.

Finally, pray for our health. Cliff has been fighting something for a while and though he’s getting better, he wasn’t healthy enough to go out with us today and remained behind. Everyone else is doing pretty good, and we’d like to keep it that way!

Ok, I’m sitting in an internet cafe at the train station. It’s 10pm-ish, our train isn’t here till around 11:40, at which point we will have about 2 minutes to dive on somewhere before it starts going again. If we miss it, we’re…well, lets just not think about that, shall we?

Yesterday, I spent most of my time with the pastors and Bible college students. I met another Job (making 3 or more of them) that runs an orphanage. He teaches the pastor training course they give here every year and travels 6 days by train one way to get here. He’s probably one of the coolest guys I’ve met so far. Very friendly, energetic, and very funny. He’s the kind of guy that always seems to be smiling. He’s 33, recently married and runs a hostel while taking care of 3 orphans. I think Allison has their names written down somewhere. He was telling us about them, but I’m absolutely horrible with names. haha

The people I’ve been most interested in are the X, which are related to the people of X. Asian in appearance, they speak hindi primarily and apparently are mostly Baptist. I found it particularly interesting that I met so many from there this time. The man’s wife, over half of his orphange, and several of the helpers, teachers and bible students are from that region. They’ve managed to keep much of their traditions without appearing to compromise on their christian beliefs. I don’t know…something about that area has grabbed me from day one.

I was pretty excited to meet him as I’ve wanted to go to this place since I first got introduced to the idea of India. This place is in the north east region. It has been closed to outsiders for years (barring a special visa) and is considered a UN hotspot due to tribal fighting. Job has assured me that if we wanted to come, he could get us the approval and that the fighting has died down significantly. I’m planning it in my head already. (;

Today overall was pretty cool. We visited the bible college, talked to the students briefly, did some worship and listened to one of the teachers share his testimony. It was amazing and words are hard to find that would describe what I saw.

The school is an old run down house, concrete floors, very sparse and utilitarian. The front room was the classroom, students stayed on hard beds lined along the walls in another room and the teachers/professors stay in a seperate room off to the side. The kitchen is in the back, which consisted primarily of a gas stove, some counter space and all the non-refigerable food laid out on burlap sacks on the floor. I think there was a small refrigerator, but I’m not exactly sure. It’s pretty crazy by our standards, for sure.

The best part was listening to the “warden” (Dean?) of the school share his testimony after we sang some worship songs. I kept looking over to Mary thinking “you’re recording this, right?” His style strongly reminded me of the Black gospel churches in the states, and while I couldn’t understand much of what he said, it was hard not to get into it or not be encouraged by what you heard.

Two men had referred to him as the biggest man in this place, even though even I seemed to dwarf him. It became obvious why very quickly. He was passionate and his story was amazing. He talked about how he actually started at the bible college before he was a christian. He grew up very poor, and a pastor in his home town would come by every so often and feed his family. He didn’t know God, but he felt he should repay him for helping his family, so he went to the bible college when the pastor asked if he’d like to go.

One man could not read, write or speak any language but Hindi. He didn’t even know John 3:16 when he was asked what it was 1 week into the school. On June 19th, 1998, he committed his life to Christ and was baptised. Furthermore, his embarrassment at his lack of education spurred him into working very hard to overcome those obstacles rather than becoming discouraged, and within 3 years, he graduated with his class able to speak at least 3 languages, read, write and had an indepth knowledge of scripture. Just his accomplishments alone were amazing, but it’s even more amazing to see him become a leader inside the very school that gave him a chance. He does it with great joy and thanks God every day for this amazing opportunity.

Today was also the first day I got to really talk to the kids at the orphanage. I’ve been running around with the adults and the students. It’s a great group of kids. I’m sure the rest of the team will be pouring in tons of details, but from my perspective, they were great! They all were very happy, full of personality and some of the coolest kids I’ve ever met. Some of the younger ones will kill you just with a smile (Of which I think is all one boy does…He and another are the cutest boys I’ve ever seen, but I don’t think I heard either of them speak once!)

We took them to the market to get clothes, hung out with them, played badminton and taught them things we never should have taught them (I hate the Gators!). We also did some other stuff that I don’t know if I’ll discuss quite yet, but Jalali is going to love it. All in all, it was a great day and none of us really wanted to leave.

Oh yeah, and Cliff: You were right. She is an amazing cook. We made her day when we told her you had made a big deal out of that and she proved to definitely live up to the hype. (; I don’t think I’ve had food that good at any point here and I doubt I will get food that good before I leave.