First week in a distant land

Hello everyone!

I apologize in advance if I don't get to respond to everyone individually at this point. I've really appreciated all the messages I got on Facebook, but I don't have gobs of time to be on the Internet if you can imagine. I guess to make a inadequate statement, India is great! We've been keeping quite busy and learning more than I can recall in one sitting.

We arrived at the beautiful Vishtar at about 6 AM or so last last Sunday. It's very beautiful here. The campus is an organic combination of trees, buildings, and various huts scattered across winding dirt paths. Vishtar houses forty some girls from the Dalit (untouchables) community. Their mothers are sex workers who can barely make enough to keep their children fed, so Vishtar takes the girls in and provides them a decent living and education. They are so adorable too! They really like us and enjoy talking to us and using their minimal English to communicate and teach us the primary language of Bangalore, Kanada. They are excellent teachers and never fail to tell us when we're screwing up.

There's plenty more to tell about Vishtar, but I'll give a few details from the week. We've had plenty of orientation sessions about India and Bangalore. Today we went into the city to see the celebration of Saint Mary's Birthday. We took the bus (without any Vishtar staff; that was a first!) and rode until we reached a big Basilica. It was packed with Indians from all religions who were gathering to reach a shrine at which they could be doused in holy water and burn a candle. There was something oddly familiar about hearing some English hymns played over the loudspeaker amidst the beggars and people pushing through the crowds to get closer to the Sari wearing Mary. We ate at an Islamic restaurant afterwards which was delicious, but served with a lot of meat. We passed through a market during our travels in which we saw huge bins of garlic, eggplant, apples, and a million other fruits I could not identify. The meat section was...well... it made me think of vegetarianism. The smell and shear amount of raw meat just lying around was pretty awful and probably not up to health standards in the US. unfortunately my vegi thoughts were rudely interrupted by the seductive odor of rotisserie chicken cooking in the nearby restaurant. Sorry little chickies, not this time.

This past weekend we stayed with host families. It was a bit of a shock to be staying with a family so soon after we had arrived, but David (he's the director of Vishtar and spends a lot of time with us) assured us that it was really valuable to establish some contacts early in the trip. I and many of my friends stayed with a Muslim family. It was such a wonderful experience. Muslims around the world are observing Ramadan in which they will abstain from food, drink, and sex during the day light for a whole lunar month (that's why Ramadan occurs during different times of the year). Another Student, Jordan, also stayed with me and we fasted with our host. It was actually not as hard as I thought it might (although we only fasted for two days). We would awaken at 4:00 AM each morning to eat before the sun rose. Often a hearty and delicious meal we would retire for a morning nap before rising at 9-10 (or 11 if you're Brendan) to tackle the day. I learned a lot about what it is like to live as a Muslim as a religious minority. The religious diversity of India is like nothing we have in the States. Muslims make up about 13% of the countries population which is dominated by a Hindu majority at 80%. These two religions have coexisted for many years in India with relative peace but not without tension. The political unease India shares with Pakistan only heightens the resentment many Hindus hold against Islam, which has erupted in violent conflict in recent history. Still, to be fair I would say that India has treated her religious minorities much better than European Christians have treated non-Christians for the past several hundred years.

Fasting was also a very enlightening experience. My host explained the biggest point of fasting was to actually appreciate your food that is so easy for us to take for granted. Also because God said so. I really would like to try fasting more often, or Jordan has recommended water and juice fasts. We shall see. Anyway, we have Yoga tomorrow morning, so I'm going to call it a night, afternoon for most of you. Thanks for checking to see what I'm up to, I promise I'll still have a million stories to share when I come back home!