Day in the Life: India
My love for India continues to grow as I enter into my fourth week here in our Indian village. Before I went on the race, I envisioned what life would look like as a world racer and wow this month has completely blown my expectations out of the water. Here is a typical day on the world race, living in a village, in India.
My team and I have the privilege this month of living on a cement roof top above the church in our village. We have set up tents and air pads and we fall asleep under the stars listening to loud Indian music from our neighbors, a crazy bird in a tree that screams like a human, and traffic from the main road. It is wonderfully windy and cool at night on top of our roof and quite pleasant after being in the heat all day.
I wake up around 7:30 every morning, just before the sun starts cooking me in my tent.(I made the mistake of sleeping past then on our first day here, and man oh man did I learn the hard way!) Every morning when I wake up, I have to put on a skirt over my pajamas to head to the bathroom and the shower, because of the culture of modesty for women here. The toilet is a squatty hole in a tin roof room (think port-o-potty, but no seat.) To shower here, you take an old paint bucket and bring it to a water tank in the middle of the village, fill it with water, and bring it back to the shower room. Bathing consists of pouring the bucket of water over your head inside the stall.
Our team is gathered for breakfast around 9 and we are served mostly curry and chapati (naan). At breakfast we are told the plan for the day and what time we will be leaving for ministry. Most days we load up the car right after breakfast and head to another village, anywhere from an hour to three hours away. My team and I along with our village pastor, his wife, our translator and her husband, two pastors from villages close by, and a Telugu (Indian tongue) worship leader all load up into one jeep.
We ride through towns, villages and busy markets, passing Hindu temples and schools on our way to our ministry site. People walking on the street stop and stare at our white faces and kids jump up and down waving and yelling hello. When we arrive at the village we are ushered into the pastor’s home and urged to sit down while they rush to get us something to drink. We share smiles and our remembered Indian greetings while word spreads into the village that we have arrived and our audience shows up. The entire village usually shows up including Hindus, Muslims, and people who would never go to a church service, but because we are here, will come and listen.
Our service begins with Telugu worship followed by English worship led by our team. Our translator introduces us to the crowd and tells why we have come to India. A member of our team then shares a parable out of the Bible and the gospel message. After the service, we pray with everyone who has come to see us. We then are brought to surrounding homes to pray for people who are sick, have newborn babies, or are house bound. A meal is prepared for our team and we are brought into the pastor’s home and served by his family. Our team is given so much food and have to politely decline being given seconds, thirds, and fourths of everything.
After the meal we continue ministering to the family and village people, praying, talking, and taking tours of their village. We say goodbye and travel to our next village and do the same until late in the evening when we travel back to our
home. We always make great friends in each of our villages and are often asked to come back for a sleepover, a birthday party or even to the police station to hang out with the police men.
We arrive back to our village around 11pm or midnight and quickly rest up for the next day. We are exhausted and drained as our packed car pulls back into our village each night, but the Lord has been faithful in providing us with an abundance of energy and renewal each day.
Please continue praying for our team and the mission God has us in this month. God bless you all.
Abby- content and fulfilled in India
