Here are some pictures of my friends as we eat dinner off Sudder Street at Blue Sky.  It is worth noting that while we have been here I have seen no black folks, other than the two men in my group and the only white folks I have scene all seem to be working at Missionaries of Charity.  There is hardly ANY diversity of color here in Calcutta.  And we stick out like a sore thumb.  Tonight after leaving dinner we were walking back to our rooms at the Baptist Mission House and I forgot to pull up my scarf around my hair (which shouldn't be a big deal because lots of women do not wear them here and no one else from my group has been wearing them the way I have).  As we walked down a road a young man jumped up from a group and hollered at us to wait.  He was fumbling with his cell phone pointing at me because he wanted to take a picture.  He had not seen someone with longish blond hair before.  It has been yet again another interesting learning experience to be the minority.  Our group is looked at WHEREVER we go because we stick out.  We are almost all taller and fairer or darker than anyone else on the street.  So anyway, consequently the scarf immediately went back in me head :) Less is more in India when it comes to attention!

Shishi Bahvan

I don’t even know what to say.  I worked at the home for children with disabilities where they hang a sign that says “Beauty is made perfect in deformity” and I am struggling with how to make sense of all I have witnessed.  Mostly I am left wishing that I was a better person…someone who loved more…who acted more like Jesus…who desired to serve more, because honestly I am not and I don’t.  I watched women from all over the world serve this morning with what seemed to me happy and bright faces and inside I was counting down the minutes until I could leave.

I am a mother and you would think I could manage to feed young children mashed up rice and curry, baby cereal and water from a spoon.  I tried to feed three different children and could not manage it.  Because even though these kids are 11 to 13 years old and around 30-40 lbs, they do not want to eat or drink.  The women have to pin them down, hold their noses closed and force them to gag down food and water.  All this to keep them alive…without it they die.  But the children are crying as they are forced to eat and I am left with difficult questions and thoughts. 

We were told most of the children in this home are there because they come from abortions gone wrong and the children survived with major disabilities…many CP, blind, deaf, etc.  We don’t know if this is true or if it is propaganda put out by a very obvious leaning to pro-life, as there is material throughout Missionaries of Charity about choosing life.  But as awful as this is to remotely think about, I am constantly debating in my own mind about the quality of life and how far is far enough to offer life to someone and how far is too far to sustain life beyond any hope of pleasure or meaning.  I do not have the answers, but it is a struggle for me.

I thought of Dawn this morning as I worked and how she talks to me about obedience to God and faithfully following even when we will never see fruit from our efforts.  She tells me regularly we obey and serve because Jesus did and he asks us to follow him…not because of what we get out of it or what we will witness in others.  But let me tell you altruistic service feels so far from me many times and yet I know being here you can serve for no other reason other than obedience.  No one will alleviate the suffering of all these people.  No one will fix all these wrongs.  No one will adopt those children today…they will live in that home until they move to the home at Prem Dan where as adults they will be cared for in the same manner and then until they move to Kali Ghat where they will die surrounded by volunteers and sisters who try to show mercy to them.

It was so hard to clean dirty children who spit food out as you try to feed them, who are incontinent, who drool, and having terribly snotty noses.  Many of them can’t communicate in any fashion.   But I realize that these babies just like my babies need someone to love them, hold them, touch them, and do for them what they can not do for themselves.  I thought of my "sister" Stephanie.  She would do so well here.  She would know how to exercise these young children’s bodies, how to help teach them what they are able to do, and she has such a great capacity to love.  In another life I could so image her spending months at a place like this, graciously giving of herself to love someone in need.  

I don't feel very adequate.  I don't feel like I love Jesus all that much.  I am not really wanting to follow where Jesus leads or love who Jesus loves.  And I pretty well aware today that I while I may be decent at talking the talk, walking the walk is altogether a very different subject.

But tomorrow is another day...and I will try again.

 Me in front of the Victoria Museum a monument to Queen Victoria built in 1906

Oldest Kali Temple in all of India.  Kali is the goddess of destruction for the state of Bengal.

Meal we ate tonight at a Bengali restaurant.

So today we spent the morning relaxing and resting before heading out to see Calcutta.  I can express to you how incredibly BAD traffic is.  There are no lanes, you go and do whatever you want with your car...constantly blowing you horn.  It is so much worse than any other country I have been in...complete chaos.  We walking through the Kali Temple.  They are nearing a big festival time for worship of Kali and so there was lots to see.  They still slaughter 20-30 goats there every morning and we saw where they do that.  They worship Kali because she is meant to destroy all evil...her destruction is for all that is bad or evil in the world.  They pay her homage through gifts of hibiscus flowers (meant to represent blood of those who are evil), gifts of bread, and others.  Incense burns throughout the temple.

Tonight we ate at a place that served all its food on banana leaves laid on rough pottery.  It was really pretty.  I was lucky enough to have them give me a cup and small saucer which will be used as a communion chalice when I am home.  The food was great.  No one here really drinks coffee...which is a big let down and it is giving lots of us headaches.  We found the oldest coffee house in Calcutta tonight and it was sweltering...no AC but we all had coffee at 7pm cause we were so thankful to find a place to serve us.  It was a huge place inside.  Our guide told us the top floor was for  "lovers" :)  But then again he has told us that about several spots today.

When we got back once again we passed by the naked babies laying asleep outside our doors...this time we did not walk over them, but our bus passed by no less than 1.5 feet from where they lay passed out.  I am not sure what to do with this knowledge.

And honestly I am afraid to go to Mother Teresa's tomorrow...some things I want to be blind to.  But please pray I can be open and see and feel and listen for God.

Good night!

Calcutta, India:

I could not be angrier at the moment!  I have had probably 10 hours of sleep total since I got up Sunday morning and it is now Wednesday …I haven’t bathed since my first day in Dubai and since then I have, walked and toured Dubai for hours, gone to the beach fully clothed to burn in the sun, ridden in multiple buses, gone dune bashing, eaten dinner in the desert barefoot and then flown to India.  I have been up for more than a day without a drop of sleep.  As we get to our stop in Calcutta where a private bath (aka a toilet and a bucket for a shower) and a bed await me I find out that MY ROOM is not going to be ready for another 3 hours.  I was supposed to get to lay down and sleep until 3:30pm when we have orientation, and the others in my group can do that…all but me and Carrier.  I am dirty, hot, pissed off and ready to squall about it.  Not the least of which is that I was the first off our bus here in the city to be greeted by mothers holding naked babies and children running around calling us “uncle and aunty” asking us to help them.  I was looking forward to the promised respite and few hours of down time in quiet…but not me.  I am stuck waiting for my room.  Did I mention that on the plane they sprayed it down with us in it for bugs? Twice!  By law they have to spray this mist in the air over all the passengers...it immediately made me feel itchy.  I didn’t think you were supposed to come to Mother Teresa’s upset that YOU don’t have a room…but does this not show my utter self-serving, egocentric nature.  My friends are snoring around me, kids are begging in the street, folks are naked and Stephanie wants to cry cause she can’t take wash her feet, take a shower and lay down on a bed.  God help me…I am a mess.  And they call me a pastor??  Huh, someone needs to say, “How did YOU ever become a minister!”

Okay so a few hours later…we are finally settled!  I took a bucket bath and it was amazing because I was so nasty!  I got a brief nap in before heading to the Missionaries of Charity for orientation.  I will be spending my days at the home for disabled young children.  I am getting ready for bed and looking forward to a full nights rest!!!!  

 The pictures are taking forever to load so I will do three...one of the constant traffic, one of men bathing in a public fountain and the other of the buildings along the streets in Calcutta. The crowds are constant.  The smells are overwhelming…more like vomit than incense on the streets.  Dogs, cats, naked children, and throngs of people…it looks a lot like Slum Dog Millionaire.  And we were immediately oriented to the fact that Sutter Street by where we are working each day is a big hot spot for human trafficking of children.  We have been instructed not to touch the children because 1.  They don’t understand appropriate affirming touch 2.  Someone is watching to see who is touched more and the more touched the more exploited they become.  People use children here to get things from you.  They are a commodity.  It is very unnerving!   But the most unnerving was walking home from dinner on a smelly crowded street in the dark, with dogs laid out in the sidewalk as if they are dead and there between dogs are two children…babies…passed out on a piece of cardboard…sleeping.  I had to first step over the dog and then literally step over the sleeping baby to get into our compound.  Whether a gimmick, whether a trick to pull at my heart strings…there were children naked sleeping in the dirty sidewalk with adults shuffling past them, dirt from their heels falling in the faces while cars roll endless past blowing horns.  Something is very wrong with that image…and it won’t be leaving me anytime soon!

Dubai:

If I heard it once today then I heard it probably at least 20 times…”this is the world’s tallest, largest, most expensive__________”.  Nothing in Dubai is small, modest, or inexpensive.  I think this has been such an important stop in our journey to study Faith and Money because it really sets the stage for seeing all the need in the world when you have been surrounded by luxury.  Dubai is clean and beautiful…but HOT.  It isn’t the South’s sticky hot, but as if you have walked in front of a giant fan blowing hot air onto you all the time.  It is oppressive.  It is so hot that the Arabian Sea was like really warm bath water…not quenching at all.  I took some really great pictures today of the world’s tallest building, the world’s tallest hotel, The Palm which is Atlantis resort in Dubai, the world’s largest indo ski slope, camels, Bedouin, belly dancers, and dune bashing cars.  But my SD card got erased…BOO!

Anyway dune bashing is crazy.  Seriously I thought we would flip over. We were in Land Cruisers with roll bars and we were flying over dunes in the dessert, doing wheelies, and throwing sand everywhere.  It is similar to going mudding on a dirt road, but dunes are STEEP.  I keep screaming…my parents never even let me go mudding on our dirt road!!!!  It was like a roller coaster in the sand.  After the ride we ended up in the dessert in the middle of nowhere for a BBQ dinner with a belly dancing show.  It is crazy to me that traditional women here must cover EVERYTHING…at times even their eyes…covered in complete BLACK head to toe…and yet for fun we will sit around in the cultural norm and watch a scantily clad woman irate and dance for us.  But I will say she was pretty amazing at it J

By the time I land in Calcutta we will have all been awake for over 24 hours…and we arrive in India at 8:30 am.  No rest for the weary!

I will say that Dubai is certainly a place to come for those looking to indulge and satisfy their whims and needs.  Tourism has now surpassed oil here for their revenue.  And surprisingly this country is about 40-50 years old.  The massive building campaign began about 5 years ago.  All we have heard is that 5 or 6 years ago none of these huge building were here.  Oil cost less here than water.  And we have learned that their supply of oil will run out in around 4 -5 more years…so they are counting on tourism staying the primary economic stimulus. 

Makes me wonder though.  We have talked so much at church about wealth not being bad, but it does matter what you do with it.  When asked where the poor are in Dubai our guide told us…there is no poor in Dubai.  I wish that some of the lavish wealth they have here could be used to alleviate the utter poverty of their neighbor countries.

Write ya in India next!

Airplane to Dubai...second to last row...56J

Me and Rev. Marcus Singleton heading out of Atlanta for the next 14 hour flight

First toilet in Dubai...

We are in a VERY nice hotel in Dubai and so far driving in from the airport the city was beautiful.  They have lights everywhere and we are in a urban downtown area...at a Ramada.  I am writing while I am uploading new "white noise" apps on my phone cause my roommate has a cold and I am a SUPER light sleeper.  My old white noise app won't work.  We have the most amazing bath tub in our room...did I say this was a nice hotel. It is HUGE and I totally took a soak and read my book while waiting for me sleeping med's to kick in.  Hopefully now when I hit the sack I will be out until morning.  

Tomorrow we have a tour that begins at 9:15 our time...middle of the night for you all.  And we are to go riding over the desert dunes and then have a BBQ dinner with belly dancing!

Anyway we came to Dubai to first experience some of the luxury of the Middle East...that will make the poverty all the more real in two days.  To see how wealth that is absolutely over the top can be nestled right next to the poorest of the poor is the whole point of this trip.  

Well I need to try and sleep even though with ear plugs in, and white noise blaring I can still hear my roommate...good thing I liked that bath tub, cause I seriously might be sleeping in it tonight!  Do you feel my pain Steve...miss you!

Saturday, September 22nd at 4:50pm

Alright 24 hours to go before heading to the airport!  I can't believe how difficult it has been to actually pack!  But the hardest part has been trying to become tech savvy...Skype on the Mac, Skype on the iPhone, blogger profile ready to go, Kindle reader loaded, and iPod music transferred to iPhone.  Anyway I am just about done with all the packing...thank goodness!

If you notice in my packing...right on top are three LARGE rolls of toilet paper!!!  Yeah, gotta have your priorities in check before heading to India :) I even have a small mini roll that travels with me everywhere I go in my fashionable fanny pack.

Alright - I will see you all on the flip side...in Dubai or India